Sarah Michelle Gellar is having fun with food
Buffy the Vampire Slayer star trades her stake for a spatula to get kids into the kitchen
Nostalgia is one helluva drug, whether we’re talking about a Full House reboot, a Fresh Prince reunion or the 20th anniversary of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Since Buffy ended, the butt-kicking Sarah Michelle Gellar had a few starring roles (such as the cancelled sitcom The Crazy Ones with the late Robin Williams) and in 2014, she along with the book’s coauthor, Gia Russo, founded Foodstirs, an online food company that sells organic baking kits and mixes for children. Think of it as the food version of the Honest Company, the baby-oriented household goods company co-founded by fellow TV action star Jessica Alba . Gellar and Russo’s new offering is Stirring up Fun with Food ($36.50, Grand Central Life & Style), a kid-oriented cookbook focusing on healthy snacks and tyke-sized meals.
The book: Buffy fans will be disappointed that there are no nods to any of her memorable roles in the 115 or so recipes divided up by months and holidays (is it too much to ask for stake-shaped bread sticks?)
Gellar writes in the intro that the book is more “food crafting” than cooking, meaning dishes are presented in a cutesy, kid-appealing manner. Think mac and cheese in cupcake tins, waffles served on and scrambled eggs eaten out of.
Most baking recipes recommend boxed mixes (which are conveniently sold on the authors’ Foodstirs site), seemingly trying to appeal to parents with limited time and kitchen experience.
Her husband and fellow ’90s teenage dream, Freddie Prinze Jr., also released a family-oriented cookbook last year. His recipes seem geared to cooking for the kids while Gellar’s book is for cooking with the kids.
The quote: “Making fun food with my kids was about more than just getting them to eat. Measuring ingredients, pulling together pots, pans, and bowls; stirring, whisking, dumping, rolling, skewering — and waiting — are skills that helped them develop self-confidence, expand their vocabulary and creative thinking, and sharpen math concepts as well as their fine and gross motor skills.”
The tester: Clearly I am not the intended audience for this book (being a childless avid home cook who stopped watching Buffy after Season 2). But I also can see how parents would be drawn to this book as a way to get their kids involved with cooking, or for ideas for throwing a children’s party.
Recipes I’d be dying to make (if I had a kid): Chewie Cookies (gingerbread men decorated like Chewbacca), Coconut Chicken Fingers (served on a stick), the classic Mummy Dogs (store-bought dough wrapped around hotdogs) and the delightfully morbid Shark Bite Cupcakes (vanilla cupcakes with strawberry preserve filling to simulate blood).
Bite-Size Pancake Muffins
Star Tested I have to hand it to Gellar and Russo for these cute little breakfast treats, which are essentially pancakes baked in mini muffin tins. They’re portable, adaptable and good for people who suck at flipping pancakes. Plus you can make dozens at a time and they even taste good cold.
I scaled down the recipe, using two cups of pancake mix rather than the whole 905g box (that would have yielded more than 150 mini pancake muffins). This version yields 36 mini pancake muffins or 12 regular-sized pancake muffins (I prefer the mini size as there’s a greater crispy-crustto-fluffy-pancake ratio).
I omitted the blueberries the recipe called for since it’s not blueberry season and I refuse to pay $5 for a half pint.
2 cups (500 mL) dry pancake mix Non-stick cooking spray 1 banana, thinly sliced crosswise 1/3 cup (80 mL) chocolate chips Maple syrup, for dipping
Preheat oven to 375 F (190 C).
In a medium-sized bowl, prepare pancake batter according to package instructions. Spray a mini muffin tray with non-stick spray. Ladle 1 tbsp (15 mL) of batter into each mould and top with chocolate chips and a banana slice.
If using a regular-sized muffin tin, fill each cup two-thirds with batter, about 1/4 cup (60 mL).
Bake for 15 minutes, or until golden brown. Remove from oven and rest for 5 minutes before removing muf- fins from tray and serving with maple syrup for dipping. Makes 36 mini pancake muffins or 12 regular-sized pancake muffins. karonliu@thestar.ca