How to Do Zoom Cookie Baking with Kids

I miss having the grandkids in the kitchen for cookie baking this holiday season. Last year, Miss T and I had a marathon session where we spent hours baking cookies together.

We had so much fun and we were so absorbed in the project, I was unaware of the time. That it was too much for a six-year-old only came to light when she went home and cried because she was so tired! (Yes, a fine grandma.)

Yesterday, we tried to replicate the experience over zoom. It takes a bit of planning and flexibility.

For young children, do as much as you can in advance, such as pre-making the dough and icing, so kids can get to the fun part. Be sure to have a parent around to help, as needed, to manage a hot oven and because it’s hard to solve some cookie baking issues remotely.

Be prepared to stop when the child starts flagging. Just have them wrap unrolled dough tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate to make later.

Planning Ahead for Cookie Baking

While it’s a fun activity for kids, when you think about it, cookie baking–especially rolled cookies cut with cookie cutters–is a complicated process:

1. First you make the cookie dough.
2. Prepare the icing.
3. Roll out and cut the cookies.
4. Bake and cool the cookies.
5. Ice and decorate.

Need a last-minute gift? Make 4-ingredient chocolate truffles.

Each step takes time, so think through in advance how you will accomplish each of them for your cookie baking event.

Best Tips and Tools for Baking with Kids

Before the project, I tried to anticipate potential problems and think of what kitchen tools and techniques could be possible solutions. Here are my tips:

• Roll the dough out between two sheets of lightly floured waxed paper or parchment paper. This allows the child to keep the rolling pin clean and to flip the rolled dough from one side to the other. Once the dough is rolled out to the right thickness, lightly flour the top of the dough and flip it. That way, when the child cuts out the cookies, the dough won’t be stuck to the bottom sheet, making it easier to remove the shapes.
• A powdered sugar shaker is great for sprinkling flour. It’s hard for a child to grab a small handful of flour to sprinkle evenly on the work surface.
• An adjustable rolling pin that enables you to roll out evenly to a specific thickness is helpful for children, to ensure even results at the proper thickness. The one shown in the photo above rolls to 1/16, 1/6, 1/4, and 3/8 inches, depending on the rings you put on the rolling pin. Here’s another version.
• A small offset spatula is ideal for frosting the cookies and easy for smaller hands.

A Checklist for your Cookie Baking Session

Here’s what you’ll need for your cookie baking project.

• Cookie dough, refrigerated and ready to roll out (see recipe suggestions below)
• Photocopy of the recipe for parents (for baking temperature, time, etc.)
• Icing, pre-tinted in different colors
• 4-inch offset spatula
• Powdered sugar shaker for flour
• Parchment paper or waxed paper, to roll out dough
• Cookie sheets
• Cookie cutters
• Various kinds of sprinkles and colored sugars

Aside from the cookie sheets, we sent everything on the list to Miss T’s house, because we live 15 minutes away. If you’re doing this cookie baking project long-distance, provide the checklist and recipes in advance so parents can make the dough and icing, and have all tools ready. You’ll have a corresponding set so you can work with the child.

Options for Cookie Baking Together

If your child is too young, not very handy in the kitchen, or has a short attention span, you might try these optional ways to enjoy cookie baking together:

• Plan on two sessions: one to roll and cut the cookies, bake, cool, and store them; and a session on a different day to decorate them.
• Bake cookies in different shapes. Send the cookies, along with icings and sprinkles and have just a cookie decorating day.
• Make and bake large gingerbread people. Provide the decorations for the features, the buttons, etc. Send icing bags or tube icing to pipe additional decorations and call it a day.

Make gingerbread houses from graham crackers with your grandchild over zoom.

Some Good Recipes for Kids

• Sugar Cookies: Elinor Klivan’s Celebration Sugar Cookies, from her book, Big, Fat Cookies, published by Chronicle Books, copyright 2005. I bought this book when it was first published, but I found the recipe online to share with you here. I like this recipe because it’s very forgiving of mistakes, and is easy for children to manipulate.
• Lemon Royal Icing from the website, Tara Teaspoon. Lemon juice gives this icing a wonderful tartness to brighten the flavor. It dries shiny and hard. The perfect cookie icing.
• Chocolate Cookies: Taste of Home‘s Chocolate Cutout Cookies and icing; recipe by Nancy Murphy. This is another easy-to-handle dough. My grandkids don’t like gingerbread, even when you tone down the spices. This cookie’s brown color mimics gingerbread, but kids will find it much more delicious.

See you Next Year!

“Call Me Grandma!” will be on winter break for the next three weeks, returning on Wednesday, January 20. Thank you for visiting my blog site this year. Best wishes for great holidays and a healthy and happy 2021!

During my absence, please check through our archives for other kid-pleasing activities you might have missed. And follow me on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter where I will be posting throughout my break.

And don’t forget to sign up for my email newsletter! When I return in January, I’ll send you a new idea each Wednesday for an activity or insight to nurture the little ones in your life.