Smarty Plants - Plants for Kids
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Cutting Onions

TOP AND TAILING ONION Before you peel an onion, you need to ‘top and tail’ it.  This means that you use a knife to cut a little bit off the top where the leaves grow from and then a little bit off the bottom where the roots come from.     CUT AN ONION IN […]

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Sugar Violets

INGREDIENTS Violets (edible flower) Egg white Caster sugar Baking paper Tray Small paintbrush METHOD Line the tray with paper. After picking the flowers, stand the stems in a jar of water. The flowers must stay dry. Beat the egg white with a fork or small whisk. Hold one violet and use the paintbrush to carefully paint the […]

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Mashing Vegetables

MASHING POTATOES & PUMPKIN Start with large chunks of cooked potato or pumpkin in a straight sided saucepan.  Use a potato masher to keep squashing the vegetables until they are smooth and there are no obvious lumps.  You have to use your muscles when mashing so it might be easier to move the saucepan to […]

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Rules for the Kitchen

SAFETY IN THE KITCHEN ALWAYS ASK AN ADULT TO HELP WHEN COOKING!  NEVER COOK ON YOUR OWN! Use safe cutting techniques when working with knives.  Ask an adult to show you how. Turn the handles of saucepans to the back of the stove so that they won’t get knocked over as you work. Always turn off blenders […]

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Boiling and Simmering

BOILING LIQUID To boil liquid, the saucepan needs to go on medium-high heat until lots and lots of bubbles rush to the surface. At this stage, the liquid is very hot and in the case of water, is 100°C.  Food is rarely cooked in boiling liquid for long; normally it is brought to a boil […]

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Peeling Vegetables

Not all vegetables need to be peeled before they are eaten but they all need to be washed well first.  Old potatoes should be peeled but baby potatoes just need to be scrubbed; young carrots also don’t need to be peeled before they are eaten.  The recipe will tell you whether to peel a vegetable or […]

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Shredding Cabbage

Vegetables such as cabbage are shredded so that they can be used in coleslaw and for cooking in the microwave, steamer or frypan.  To shred a cabbage, it first needs to be cut in half and then each piece needs to be cut into half again.  Cut out the hard core as this part isn’t […]

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Grating Vegetables and Cheese

Vegetables and cheese are grated so that they are very thin; much thinner than can be achieved with a knife.  Grated cheese is used in sandwiches and salads and hard cheeses such as parmesan are very finely grated to sprinkle over Italian dishes such as spaghetti bolognese. Graters come with different size holes.  The larger […]

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Healthy Food Traffic Lights

Across Australia, school canteens use the ‘traffic light’ system to help teach kids to make healthy food choices.  Since this is already familiar to them, Smarty Plants has used the same symbols for our recipes so that little chefs can make good decisions on what they cook and eat. GREEN TRAFFIC LIGHT – Eat Often […]

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Slicing and Dicing

SLICING VEGETABLES  To slice a vegetable, hold it onto a chopping board with  one hand whilst using a knife to cut it into disks.  These can be cut very thinly or fairly thick but all pieces should be the same width.                 DICING VEGETABLES Diced vegetables means to chop […]

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Contact

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The Blog!

  • Gardening’s not rocket science!

    Years ago, when our parents planted out their vegie patches, they turned over the soil, mixed some sheep manure through,...

    08 Dec,13
  • Have fun with your food!

    Just because I’m a grown up doesn’t mean that I can’t play with my food! The other day, I became...

    05 Dec,13
  • Little Halloween Pumpkin Heads

    Did you manage to grow some pumpkins for Halloween this year?  Don’t worry if you didn’t as they’re still available...

    28 Oct,13
  • Crazy Capsicums

    Capsicums are a confusing vegetable; not least because they are actually a fruit!  But also because they are related to...

    20 Oct,13
  • Take broccoli off the table!

    Since the beginning of time parents have been asking the age old question, ‘How do I get my kids to...

    06 Oct,13
  • Garden Gnomes are Back

    Yay! Garden Gnomes are back! Where have they been all these years?  I imagine that, having been discarded by gardeners...

    18 Sep,13
  • Planting a Bare-rooted Fruit Tree

    It’s winter! It’s time to plant an orchard!  You can do this at any time of the year but in...

    06 Jun,13
  • Warheads v. Radishes!

    Why will kids turn up their noses at radishes but they’ll eat Warhead candies?  Or they refuse to eat Brussels...

    03 May,13
  • Room to Move

    I get a bit peeved when I watch some gardening shows or read gardening books that tell people that they...

    26 Apr,13
  • Veg Out!

    Veg out!  Don’t you just love vegging out?  Sitting on the sofa doing absolutely nothing except watching a bit of...

    08 Feb,13
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