For her last birthday, my six-year-old granddaughter, Juliet, received the Green Princess Cookbook: Sweets and Treats to Save the Planet. As we looked through each page together, she kept repeating, “Ooh, let’s make this one.” I love to cook with my family. I’ve cooked with my grandma and mom. Now I’m cooking with my daughter and two granddaughters.
I enjoy looking at recipes and have been collecting them for four decades. The color photographs in Green Princess Cookbook look yummy. There’s a photograph for each of the thirty recipes. They’re divided into categories of drinks and ice cream, dips and chips, bigger bites, breads and spreads, and sweets and treats.
These recipes are healthy and fun. Subtitled Sweets and Treats to Save the Planet, the book is part of Barbara Beery’s series of cookbooks for girls that “encourage them to participate and celebrate the joys of cooking.” I like recipes that are easy, and these are definitely easy, as well as kid-friendly.
Author Barbara Beery has a degree in elementary education, three children, and founded Batter Up Kids Cooking School eighteen years ago. Her mission is to bring children, families, and communities together to make a positive health-conscious difference in our next generation of cooks.
Beery believes that children are the key ingredient in changing the way Americans eat. I completely agree and we moms and grandmas have a great opportunity to teach them. In the short introduction, called “It’s Easy Being Green,” Beery explains what’s organic and why buying local is good for the environment. She also explains farmers markets, community-supported agriculture, and community gardens. She suggests that you make all the recipes in her book with organic and local ingredients whenever possible.
Juliet understands organic and local. She and her parents and sister have a bountiful vegetable garden. They’ve harvested pounds of sweet cherry tomatoes, several dozen of the sweetest cantaloupes I’ve ever tasted, and gigantic cucumbers.
We decided to make the Cinnamon-Maple Crisps recipe. It required only three ingredients and could be made in ten minutes. We had so much fun. We didn’t make our crisps heart-shaped like the photo, but they still tasted delicious. Juliet did all the steps by herself. After we cooked them, we did a taste comparison. She preferred the honey flavor over maple syrup.
We can’t wait to cook together again. Juliet wants to make “Baby Butterfly Cupcakes” and I want to make “Cornbread in a Recycled Can.”
Cinnamon-Maple Crisps Recipe
24 (3 1/2 – inch wonton wrappers
2 teaspoons maple syrup or honey
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line 2 sheet pans with parchment paper or a clean brown paper grocery bag cut to fit pans. Set aside. In a small bowl, combine maple syrup or honey and cinnamon.
Carefully remove wonton wrappers from package, one at a time, and place on a cutting board. Using assorted 2-inch cookie cutters, cut wonton wrappers into various shapes. Place cutouts ½ inch apart on prepared sheet pans. Lightly brush each wrapper with cinnamon-honey mixture.
Place sheet pans in oven and bake for 4 to 6 minutes. Watch the crackers carefully as they brown fast! Remove from oven and cool for 5 minutes before removing crackers from pan and serving.
