Cooking With Kids: Kefir Lemon Pound Cake Glaze

Encouraging Speech & Creating Yum! Kefir Lemon Pound Cake Glaze

Who doesn’t love pound cake? I wanted to make a pound cake, but, wanted to add a nutritional boost without compromising texture or flavor. I decided to add Kefir Yogurt to the recipe (you can find it here). The pound cake was sweet, lemony and absolutely perfect. To achieve the best results with this pound cake, make the cake the day before or buy your favorite pre-made pound cake. The glaze makes the cake it fresh and lemony as well. Drizzle over the pound cake, let the glaze dry and you will achieve absolute “pound cake heaven”.

Ingredients

Pound Cake

Pound cake make ahead using our recipe here or buy your favorite pre-made pound cake

Glaze

• 1 cup of confectioners sugar
• 1-lemon
• 1-2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice it makes a difference
• 1 tablespoon of Kefir Plain

Directions For Glaze

Adult/Child: Measure out one cup of powdered sugar and put in a bowl.

Adult/Child: Cut lemon in half. A child can squeeze lemon juice into a small dish, and catch and remove any seeds. Once you have lemon juice, measure out 1-2 tablespoons (depending on taste)of the lemon juice and add to powdered sugar.

Child: Measure 1 tablespoon Kefir and add to bowl with other ingredients.

Child:Whisk together ingredients until you have the right consistency. I like my glaze thick and spreadable. If you want it thicker, add more sugar. To make thinner, add more lemon juice or Kefir.

Child: Using the whisk, drizzle glaze over top of pound cake.

Adult: Add lemon zest on top of the glaze to finish the cake. Optional: we used a micro plane to grate the lemon rind.

Adult/Child: Cut into slices and serve

Eat! Talk! Enjoy!

Language Time Tips:

1. Build vocabulary with nouns and actions! Nouns: pound cake, lemon zest, knife, sugar, lemon juice, lemon, kefir, bowl, whisk Actions: cut, whisk, measure, mix, zest, add, create, taste, eat, slice.

2. Colors and Size: Compare the different ingredients and their various sizes. When you buy the lemons at the market, choose some small ones and some larger ones. To work on colors, pick up a lime and discuss the color difference between a lime and a lemon. With regard to size, you can work on more complex concepts when you cut the lemon. First, cut it in half, then a quarter, etc. Have your child identify the largest and smallest pieces.

3. Comment and Describe! Encourage words such as sour, sweet, moist, smooth, creamy and wet. Help facilitate comments such as “The lemon tastes sour”, “The lemon zest smells “. Encourage more specific vocabulary that describes the food in detail.

4. Sequencing and recalling information: Follow the sequence of the recipe and emphasize the steps of mixing the ingredients for the glaze. You can even focus on just the sequencing events of squeezing the lemon (first cut the lemon, then squeeze the lemon and then take out the pits)

5. Answering and asking “wh” questions: Sample “wh” questions include, “What are we making?”, “What makes the cake sweet?”, “How do we make the glaze thinner?”, “What ingredients did we use to create the glaze?”. Encourage your child to ask questions. If your child has difficulty with this, have a list of questions either written down on in picture form to help facilitate asking questions.

Literacy! Literacy Tip! Focus on key words in the recipe and ask your child to identify the written word in the recipe. Words such as the nouns and actions above would be an excellent place to start. Use a highlighter to make those words stand out!

Recommended Books: The Red Lemon by Bob Stake, Lemons are not Red by Laura Vaccaro Seeger

Encourage Speech & Create Yum With These Recipes for Cooking With Kids

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This post originally appeared on our July/August 2015 Magazine