Cooking with Kids: Good avocados can be hard to find

Avocados should feel soft when you very gently press the skin, but there should be no dents or bruises.

Good avocados can be tricky to find. Often when you buy them, they seem nice and ripe, but are black once you slice through, or quite tough and hard.

There is no exact way of stopping this happening, but if you look out for nice bumpy skin it is usually means the avocado is ripe, green softer skin is often a sign it is underripe.

It should feel soft when you very gently press the skin, but there should be no dents or bruises.

After you cut an avocado, the lovely green flesh can blacken. If you are storing it in the fridge for later, squeeze a bit of fresh lemon or lime juice on the cut side of an avocado and this should keep it fresher. You can also leave the stone inside.

Seasoning your food is important for getting good, tasty flavours. It is a great technique to learn as it comes in handy with all savoury cooking, and some baking too. The reason we season food is to bring out the flavours and to help them blend together.

Too much salt and food will not taste good, but too little and you will feel like something is missing from your dish.

The best trick is to add a little seasoning during the cooking then make sure it is correct right at the end.

Guacamole

recipe by:Michelle Darmody

A simple recipe for an all-time favourite.

Servings

1

Preparation Time

 15 mins

Total Time

 15 mins

Course

 Side

Cuisine

 Mexican

Ingredients

• 2 nice ripe avocados

• 1 large lime

• a pinch of salt and a pinch of cracked black pepper

• ½ of a red chilli

• ¼ of a small red onion

• a bunch of fresh coriander

Method

1. First ask a grown-up to cut both of the avocados in half. Scoop out the nice soft green flesh with a big spoon.

2. Juice the lime and mash the avocado in a bowl with the lime juice. Add in your salt and pepper. Taste a small bit on a clean spoon to see if you need to add more salt and pepper.

3. Carefully chop up the ¼ of the red onion into very small little cubes or pieces.

4. Carefully chop the red chilli into very tiny pieces.

5. Stir the onion and chilli into the avocado.

6. Rip-up the coriander with your fingers, into small pieces, or chop it up.

7. You can either add the coriander into the guacamole or sprinkle it on top. It has a strong flavour and not everyone likes it, so if it is on top, they can take scoop without the coriander. Stirring it in will add a stronger flavour to your guacamole dip. It is up to you, the chef.

Hummus

recipe by:Michelle Darmody

Quick and easy - the perfect dip!

Servings

4

Preparation Time

 20 mins

Total Time

 20 mins

Course

 Side

Cuisine

 Middle-Eastern

Ingredients

• 1 tin chickpeas, they are generally 400g

• ½ a clove of garlic

• 2 tsp tahini paste

• ½ tbsp lemon juice

• 2 tbsp natural yoghurt

• 1 tbsp olive oil

• a pinch of salt and a pinch of cracked black pepper

Method

1. Use a tin opener to open the tin of chickpeas. Pour the liquid from the tin into a bowl and keep it for later. Ask a grown-up to help as the edges at the top of the tin might be sharp.

2. Crush your garlic.

3. Put the chickpeas into your blender. Add the crushed garlic, the tahini, lemon juice, yoghurt and olive oil to the blender. Pour in half of the liquid from the chickpea tin. Add your salt and pepper. Turn on your blender and blitz everything together until it is a smooth paste. If it is dry, or too thick add some more of the liquid and blitz it again. Taste and see if you need to stir in a little more salt and pepper.

Activity: Chitting potatoes

You can grow new potato plants from some spuds in your cupboard. Now is the time to start planning if you want a good crop of your very own. You start something called ‘chitting’. This means allowing little green sprouts to form on your potatoes before putting them outside in the soil. 

You can grow potato plants in an old sack on a balcony, or in a garden. To chit your potatoes simply place them into an egg carton and leave them to sit in a cool bright place for about three weeks, until little sprouts form. You want the sprouts to be about a centimetre and a half before planting the potatoes in nice rich soil.