Ratatouille Cookbook for Your Little Chef

Ok…now that Halloween is over we can begin talking about the Christmas Holiday.  I HATE it that the stores start setting-up their Christmas displays the day after labor day…sometimes as soon as the 4th of July.  But now that witches brooms and skeletons are back in the closet I declare it open season.

I was wondering around a bookstore the other day, when I came across this great children’s cookbook, What’s Cooking?-A Cookbook for Kids.  The book’s inspiration came from the movie Ratatouille.  According to reviews it is a great cookbook with a lot of the basics, but influenced by French cuisine and our friend Remy.  The store display said that it was written by Thomas Keller.  FYI there is only one recipe written by him and he writes the introduction, but something tells me your little chef won’t care:

This fun cookbook for kids is well designed and really useful. Each of the 27 recipes takes up a page spread. On one side is the recipe, on the other a full-page color photo of the food. Better still, the book has a hidden spiral binding, so it lies flat on a kitchen counter. Focused mainly on French cuisine, the recipes range from easy to “master chef” and are divided into five sections: breakfast; lunch; breads, salads and soups; dinner; and desserts. Each includes an extra tip, such as how to flip a crepe or what bread works best for French toast.

Here are the recipes:

BREAKFAST
* Colette’s Crepes
* Ooh La La French Toast
* Remy’s Famous Omelets
* French Breakfast Muffins

LUNCH
* Gusteau’s Grilled Cheese
* Croque Monsieur
* Quiche Lorraine
* Easy Faux Escargots (using gherkin pickles for snails, tortilla-wrap slices for shells)
* Crazy Cheese Straws
* Cheese Fondue

BREADS, SOUPS AND SALADS
* A Classic Baguette
* Vichyssoise
* Chef’s Salad
* Salad Nicoise
* Dijon Vinaigrette

DINNER
* Gusteau’s Ratatouille
* Linguini Alfredo with Peas
* C’est Magnifique Salmon (with lemon and dill sauce)
* Remy’s Macaroni and Cheese
* Pizza Rats (the slices use black olives for eyes and noses)
* Oven-Baked French Fries

DESSERTS
* Colette’s Apron Cake
* Django’s Dirt Cake (a brownie-like cake decorated with gummy bears and plastic rats)
* Cheery Cheesecakes
* Chocolate Bouchons (from California celebrity chef Thomas Keller)
* Chocolate Rats (chocolate-coated apricot bodies with licorice whiskers, peanut-half ears and rolled Starbursts for the tails)
* Eiffel Tower Cookie Sundae (with the tower made from sugar wafers)

With gorgeous photos, cute artwork inspired by the movie “Ratatouille” and a nice mix of serious and silly recipes, this is a cookbook kids could really get into.

– By Julie Neal, author of The Complete Guide to Walt Disney World.

Next week Ratatouille will be out on DVD, so when you pick-up the movie buy the cookbook as well.  This will make a fun edition to you cookbook library and makes a great gift for your foodie-to-be.