By Melanie A. Albert, intuitive cooking expert, author, and speaker. Founder & CEO Experience Nutrition Group, LLC
What a fun kids cooking class at The Farm at South Mountain. First, it is such an honor and so much fun to guide the kids how to prepare amazing, simple dishes with simple local, organic, farmers’ market goodies. Second, thanks so much to The Farm for the honor to teach hands-on intuitive cooking classes in your beautiful venue.
In this 1-hour class, the girls and boys aged 9-14, prepared a cold soup with local Arizona tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, fresh lemons, garlic, and salt. Then they prepared their own version of hummus with lots of fresh, locally grown herbs, and made it into a wrap with bamboo steamed collard greens. Finally, the kids had so much fun beautifully, creativity plating their creations.
Enjoy the fun photos from the class and then have fun creating your own cold soup and hummus with your own seasonal produce.
The calm…our set for the Kids Cooking at The Farm…all ready for the kids with local, organic goodies from the Old Town Scottsdale Market, Singh Farms, Abby Lee Farms, and fresh herbs from Daddy’s Gourmet.
I think the kids in the cooking class had the most fun massaging the tomatoes for the cold soup and beautifully plating their culinary creations. They also enjoyed munching on fresh strawberries and refreshing cucumbers.
Take a look at these amazing culinary creations and notice the joy of the kids!
Excerpt from “A New View of Healthy Eating: Simple Intuitive Cooking with Real Whole Foods,” by Melanie A. Albert
Summertime Tomato Gazpacho Cold Soup
A fresh, cold tomato gazpacho is refreshing, especially on warm days. Make this quick cold tomato soup with red, orange, and yellow tomatoes and red, orange, yellow, and green bell peppers for a bright summer side dish. Be sure to try the beautiful (some may think ugly) heirloom tomatoes. If you are fortunate enough to purchase a whole flat of really ripe organic tomatoes, make a big batch of tomato gazpacho for a summertime picnic.
Simple Ingredients: Soup
- 10 medium tomatoes, cut into eighths
- 4 red, orange, yellow, and/or green bell peppers, seeded and rough chopped
- 3 cucumbers, rough chopped
- 2 jalapeno or Anaheim peppers, seeded and rough chopped
- ½ cup fresh cilantro, chopped
- ½ cup fresh lime juice
- 6-8 garlic cloves, minced
- Up to 2 cups water, if needed
- Sea salt and pepper, to taste
Simple Ingredients: Topping
- 4 tbsp cucumber, small diced
- 4 tbsp tomato, small diced
- 4 tsp cilantro leaves
Simple Steps
- Place all soup ingredients in a large bowl.
- Mix well.
- Puree half of the ingredients in a high-speed blender until smooth. In the kids class, the kids massaged the tomatoes rather than blending them.
- Combine pureed soup with chopped veggies.
- Taste and season with sea salt and/or pepper.
- Top with diced cucumbers, tomatoes, and cilantro.
- Enjoy!
- Refrigerate leftover gazpacho soup and enjoy the next day for an even more flavorful soup.
If you are interested in learning simple culinary skills, whole foods recipes, and ultimately cooking intuitively, my book, “A New View of Healthy Eating,” is available.
