Welcome to kidscookdinner.com, a website I started with my sister in 2015 to document what we were cooking (or trying to cook ), to encourage more kids to cook and to remind people that a lot of people don’t have enough to eat.  For more about the website, scroll down. For what we most recently cooked, stay right here.

Tonight I made a surprisingly quick and easy dinner: rack of lamb.  The only thing you have to remember is to marinate the lamb at least 2 hours before you cook it.  And your marinade can be as simple as olive oil, chopped garlic, and salt and pepper.  We happen to have rosemary and thyme in our garden (which Koko helped find) and that made the marinade even better.

Here’s the ingredients I used:

The rack of lamb was frenched, which means the meat and fat were removed from the ends of the ribs. The first step of making the marinade was stripping the rosemary leaves and thyme leaves from their stems.

Then it was time to chop up the herbs.

After that, I chopped up the garlic and added olive oil.  I spread the mix over the rack of lamb and put it in a plastic bag for 2 hours.

After letting the lamb marinate for 2 hours, I preheated the oven to 450 degrees.  I removed the rack from the bag and wrapped each rib bone in aluminum foil to keep them from getting burnt (honestly, this was the trickiest part of the dish).  Then it was into the oven in a foil-lined pan for 15 minutes.  After 15 minutes, the lamb was nicely browned so I reduced the heat to 300 degrees for 20 minutes. I took it out and let it stand for 5 minutes.  The meat was perfectly medium-rare.

We ate it with couscous and a spinach salad.

Delicious!

Welcome to kidscookdinner.com, a website I started with my sister in 2015 to document our food adventures, encourage kids to cook and highlight the issue of hunger in American and the world.  Scroll down to learn more about the website and hunger relief charities.  For tonight’s menu, stay right here.

Tonight I wanted to cook something new but also needed it to be something that didn’t take a long time since I have a lot of homework (and college applications).  My mom suggested I try this shrimp curry recipe, which, because it has shrimp and couscous (two quick-cooking ingredients), wouldn’t take too long.  She was right: it was quick and easy. Ingredients are as follows: 2 tablespoons olive oil, 1 medium oil, three tablespoons red curry paste, 1 can coconut milk, 1 pound small tomatoes, 1-1/4 cup couscous, 1 cup frozen peas, 1 pound large peeled shrimp, and salt and pepper.

The first step was to slice the onion thinly and cut the tomatoes in half.

(I also chopped up some veggies for separate stir fry) but that was easy.

The next step was to saute the onions in the olive oil with a little salt.

When the onions were translucent, I added the red curry paste, the coconut milk, and a cup of water.  I brought that to a boil and added the sliced tomatoes.

After 3 minutes, I reduced the heat to low, added the couscous and frozen peas.

Finally, I layered the shrimp on top, covered the pan, and cooked for 5 minutes.  All of the liquid was absorbed, but when I tested the couscous, it was a little crunchy, so I added a 1/4 cup of water and let cook for 3 more minutes.  One tip for cooking the shrimp: besides peeling them, take off the tail.  No one wants to bite into the tail.

Then I plated it. Delicious.  Just needed a little salt and pepper.

Welcome to kidscookdinner.com, a site my sister and I started more than 5 years ago.   As the weather turns colder, I felt like something hearty and comforting for Sunday dinner so I turned to one of our favorite family dishes: Braised Lamb Shanks.  I make this the day before I want to eat it so the flavors really combine (and so it’s easy to skim the solidified fat off the top).  Ingredients are straightforward: lamb shanks, carrots, onions, garlic, chopped tomatoes, red wine, broth, and cannellini beans, and I serve it over couscous.

The first step is to really salt and pepper the lamb, and then brown it all over in a saucepan with a little olive oil.  Once the lamb shanks were browned, I put them in our slow cooker.

Meanwhile, the onions, carrots and garlic had to be chopped.

Then I sauteed the onions and carrots sauteed in the same saucepan in which I had cooked the meat.  Once they were softened and browned I added them to the slow cooker.

Then I added the wine, broth and tomatoes to the slow cooker and turned it on high for 6 hours.

This is what it looked like 6 hours later; the lamb was falling off the bone:

And this is what it looked like the next morning (with the oil and fat solidified).

I spooned most of the yellow stuff (fat) off, and about an hour before we were going to eat, reheated it on a low temperature.  I usually add the canned white beans at this point but forgot this time.  It still tasted great!

Final product.