Recipe for Success
Just Enough cooks in the kitchen,
According To Kulinary Kids NYC
I
t only took two classes to turn Olivia
Levy, 3, into a spinach lover. “My daughter is a very adventurous eater,” says
Lisa Levy. “But no matter what I have done,
we have never had success with spinach.”
The turning point came during a Kulinary
Kids NYC cooking class where a group of
six 3-year-old students gathered in a friend’s
kitchen in Soho to make spinach artichoke
casserole. “Now [Olivia] asks for spinach almost every day. I had to call up her teachers so
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she could have the recipe that day.”
And it’s not just Olivia who is expanding her
palate. “We have students who never ate meat
making and eating their own meatballs,” says
Daniela Ben-Zion, 34, who started the company
with Dana Ravner in March of 2009. “Something wonderful happens when you involve
your kids in the kitchen. They take pride in
their own creation.”
The two New York moms first met as nursery school teachers at Central Synagogue and
reunited 10 years later at the JCP in Soho where
coincidentally both their kids went to school.
Brainstorming was almost instantaneous. “We
both wanted to work,” says Ravner, 32, “but we
had young children. This was a great way to
return to teaching on our own time, in our own
way.”
It took the women three months to get the
company up and running with two groups of
six kids enrolled in a four-week summer season.
This semester they are running seven groups
with two curriculums. But in a city where kids’
cooking classes are offered in almost every
neighborhood, it takes more than a yummy
bowl of cake batter to keep a company going.
“When we teach a class we are teaching from
an educator’s perspective as well as a culinary
perspective,” says Ben-Zion. “We have put a lot
of focus into designing age-appropriate curriculums. It’s not just 10 weeks of recipes.”
Curriculums like Eating the Rainbow (for
the younger set) and Cooking the Alphabet
incorporate art, science and literary components into each class. In Eating the Rainbow,
kids focus on a different color of the rainbow
each week. “Last week was red and so we spoke
about the color red and different things in our
world that are red,” says Ravner. “Then we
made sweet-and-sour meatballs with red sauce
and read the book Cloudy With a Chance of
Meatballs.”
During a one-hour class, kids learn reading,
measuring, mixing—and perhaps most important—the joy of cooking and eating together.
“Part of what it so wonderful about the class is
that we come into your home,” says Ben-Zion.
“There is this feeling of intimacy. You’re in your
own home with your cooking teachers. Your
friends are there. You prepare a meal together,
you eat it together and then you can all take leftovers home to your parents or siblings. And at
the end of 10 weeks everybody gets a cookbook
with the recipes they made from the session.”
For more information, visit kulinarykidsnyc.com
—Wendy Straker Hauser
playground april 2010
LeshemLoft
Entrepreneur
Let Them Eat Cake
What happens
when three healthconcious moms
with a penchant for
sweets put their
Full Mandarin Immersion
for children has come to
the Upper West Side!
(Ages 1-10)
• Pre-K and K
• After school
• Mommy & Me
• Summer Camp in
NY and Beijing
heads together? You
get the best of both
worlds—delicious
brownie truffles,
ultra-moist muffins,
decadent cookies—
all freshly baked with
(gasp) whole grains,
fruits, vegetables
and beans. “We wanted to nourish our children’s bodies
but we didn’t want them to eat food that seemed like
fied nutritionist with a background in cake design. “So,
Enrolling Now
instead of complaining about the problem, we resolved
Call for a private tour/consulation on our program.
punishment,” says co-creator Alexandra Zohn, a certi-
to take matters into our own hands.” The result is Three
Tablespoons, a “smart baking company” based out of a
175 Riverside Blvd (at 68th Street)
New York, NY 10069
www.bilingualbudsnyc.com or 212.787.8088
shared kitchen workspace on the Upper West Side.
While Alexandra is busy filling orders for brownies,
cupcakes and chocolate chip cookies baked with hidden vegetables (they ship to anywhere in the U.S.), her
partners Amy Nissanoff and Cecilia Rebelledo focus on
BALLET HISPANICO
SCHOOL OF DANCE
2010 SUMMER CAMPS
the business end. “We met as new moms when our kids
were less than a year old,” says Alexandra. “Now they’re
almost 5.”
It was Alexandra’s experience feeding her 2-year-old
son that led toThree Tablespoons, which opened its
doors in September of last year. “My son was refusing
to eat healthy food,” she says. “So I had to think of ways
NEW DANCE, MUSIC
AND ME
to mask food.” The three moms, all in their mid-30s, test
out each new recipe on their kids before offering it to
the general public. “My daughter has a very sensitive
I knew we were in business.”
For more information or to place an order, go to-
threetablespoons.com
—W.S.H.
PHOTO BY EDUARDO PATINO
palatte,” says Alexandra. “ The first time she said yum,
AGES 6–15
WEEKLONG CAMPS BEGIN JULY 12
MON–FRI, 9:30AM–4:00PM
PRE-SCHOOL
SUMMER DANCE
CAMPS
AGES 3–5
WEEKLONG CAMPS BEGIN JUNE 7
MON–FRI, 9:00AM–12PM
212–362–6710
BALLETHISPANICO.ORG
Cecilia Rebolledo, Amy Nissanoff
BALLET HISPANICO
167 WEST 89TH STREET / NYC
and Alexandra Zohn.
playground april 2010
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