Getting the kids involved in cooking

All of my children love to cook. Normally that would be great. The problem is that my kitchen is extremely small. You turn around from the stove and there's the sink. I honestly can't stand to have anyone in the kitchen when I'm trying to cook. I know the kids would love to help out and my older son would love to just plain learn how to cook. We do have a kitchen table that would keep them out of the way from me preparing things on the counter or using the stove. What types of things can I have them do to where they feel like they are pitching in, yet learning something at the same time?

When my son was 4 I would let him help stir the food in a pan. He really enjoyed it. I also had him peeling potatoes and carrots. He loved making sauces or scrambling eggs. He would always ask questions to so he has a lot of knowledge about cooking and safety in the kitchen. He always knew the stove was hot and not to touch pans. We always kept the handles in and away from boiling water. Now he is 13 years old and is a great cook. He makes omelettes, shrimp, pasta. He loves cooking and I think it all began when he was little and hang out in the kitchen with me and helped from an early age.

I have two kids and a small kitchen as well. My kids are 19 months and 3 years. What I do is pull a chair up to where I am working and let them take turns standing next to me to help. It can get hard because they both really want to help at the same time. It was really frustrating trying to cook when they are both fighting for a turn, but I've been doing that for about two months now and its made a big difference. They don't fight as much for a turn with helping and I think making them wait helps teach them patience.

I had a small kitchen when my daughter was starting to get interested in cooking, too... not so small now after a move, luckily, though!
I always made space for a chair for her to stand on, though. My mom never really introduced us to that (I don't think any of us were interested!) so I wanted to make sure it was different for my daughter when she started showing an interest.

When there were things for her to do at the table (which was in the dining room and a bigger area) it worked great and I didn't need space in the kitchen when we did that.