Setting the Stage for Culinary Chaos
Having your kids help in the kitchen or on the grill is something that I am sure that we have all done at some point. It is a fun and easy way to let them feel like they are involved and that they themselves are, “cooking.” Well, have you ever actually turned them loose? My three year old and four year old love to help me when it comes to things like spritzing, seasoning (with my help), and anything else I will allow them to do. We are finishing up our holiday break and going back to school this week, so we decided to let them have a little bit of fun and let them make our lunch. When i say make our lunch, I mean I let them do quite literally everything.
The Seasoning Saga
I started by lining up all my seasonings that they have seen me use countless times and letting them choose their preferred seasoning. My four year old chose Meat Church Holy Gospel, which is usually my go to when I do burgers because that is their mom’s favorite, so I was very impressed that is the one she chose. My three year old on the other hand, decided to get real crazy and go with Meat Church’s Honey Hog rub. If you are not familiar with Meat Church, Honey Hog is a sweeter rub mostly used for things like pork and chicken, not your average beef rub. It was their choice though, so it was on from there!
Burger Patties Extravaganza
After choosing our seasonings of choice, we gloved up, grabbed some 80/20 ground beef and began making burger patties. This was probably the most entertaining part of this whole process. It started off very civil, both kids were calmly patting the meat into patties trying their best to make their best burger impressions. By the end of it, my four year was just smashing the burger as hard as she could on the tray, and my three year old was trying his best to make a “super patty.” I was going to let him go for it, but fortunately my four year old told him that they had to make enough for everyone, so he broke it up into three different “patties.”
How Much Seasoning is too Much Seasoning?
After our very interesting burger patties were created, it was time for seasoning, oh lord. Both were very timid at first, but then I think they began to notice that certain parts of the patty were not seasoned and then it was game over. At one point my three year old had the Honey Hog rub completely upside down over one patty. I will say, I did step in at this point and suggest that he divide some of the seasoning out between his other patties, which luckily he agreed to so that we weren’t eating more seasoning than patty. Once everything was seasoned up and ready to go, it was time to cook.
Into the Grilling Arena
I will say so that you aren’t completely concerned about my parenting skills that I handled the actually cooking portion of this endeavor. I let them choose what they wanted to cook their burgers on, the Blackstone, the Big Green Egg, or the Traeger, and they both agreed on the Blackstone. I got everything going on the Blackstone, and made sure that their burgers were cooked all the way through. I then let the kids grab their favorite cheese, throw them on there, and we were done!
The Moment of Truth: Tasting the Creations
Now it was time to eat. Both kids were absolutely giddy to try their burgers. My wife and me on the other hand were quite the opposite. I envisioned that episode of Bluey on Disney Junior where the dad has to eat his kids entire disgusting meal that they cook and he ends up vomiting all over their backyard, but I started this, and I was going to finish it and be a good sport. I will say, both burgers were surprisingly decent tasting. Not too salty like I feared, and the three year old’s sweeter burger actually had a decent taste to it.
Memories Made in the Kitchen
Overall, it was a really fun activity for us to do, and the kids had an awesome time doing it. They talked about it the rest of the day, and when we FaceTimed grandma later in the day, they made sure to tell her all about it as well. I want cooking and bbq to build great memories with my family. I want these to be things that they remember their entire lives, and that they look back on memories from their childhood when they get older and think about moments like this when they were little kids. If you would like to see the entire adventure, it is on Instagram and TikTok, posted below. I hope that you get to share moments like this with your family. If you have any special things like this that you do, I would love to hear about them. Leave a comment below and let me know what sort of things you do with your family!
Happy Grilling!
Kaydon
