Rye Native's Cookbook Aims to Connect Parents and Kids in the Kitchen

Cooking and eating together as a family has become less common in some American households as more people congregate around the television or spend time alone surfing the Internet rather than conversing around a dinner table.

According to the Journal of American Medicine, 43 percent of American families eat together every day. American families also spend nearly $2,700 a year on eating out.

To encourage more family cooking, one former Rye resident has teamed with three other moms on a cookbook that connects kids and parents in the kitchen.

Maureen Petrie, a Rye High school graduate whose family has been in Rye for several generations, has co-authored a book called "Picture Me Cooking" with Rebecca Dubas Rice, Amanda Coopersmith and Colleen Kennedy, all moms who met through their neighborhood bus stop in Bucks County, Pa. 

During a girls night out, the moms, who worked in diverse professions such as teaching and consulting, discussed doing something that they were passionate about. Two of their passions were their children and cooking, so what resulted was "Picture Me Cooking"—a marriage between the two.

"Picture Me Cooking" is part cookbook, scrapbook and photo album. The book includes 54 family-friendly recipes. Parents make the recipes with their children, taking pictures while they prepare the meal. After they've finished cooking, they can then add the photos into a photo pocket that accompanies each recipe page in the book.

Petrie, who moved to Pennsylvania in 2005 and whose 5-year-old son and 9-year-old daughter are featured in the book, said cooking allows parents to interact with their kids in a more casual way. 

"If you're cooking with them, odds are they are going to open up," she said. "Instead of interacting with your kids by trying to drill them about their day, they open up a lot more when they're cooking."

Coopersmith said cooking with her daughter has had that effect.

"When we cook together, my teenage daughter feels more comfortable about talking about her day," she said. "It is a time when we reconnect on the large, and often smaller, details about our day."

Petrie, who had been working at Xerox before being laid off, also said the book may resonate more with families because of the recession.

Cooking at home tends to be less of an expense than eating in a restaurant. In the past year, about 75 percent of Americans have cooked more meals at home and intend to keep doing so, according to a recent survey by Con Agra Foods.

The moms involved with the book said cooking together as a family can also lead to other money-saving, yet enriching home activities, such as a family game night. It can also teach children important life skills, according to Rebecca Dubas Rice, one of the book's co-authors.

"Eating out is expensive," Rice said. "Cooking at home is economical and it breeds self sufficiency, which will be an important skill for kids to have later in life."

The book has also served to bring families together across generations. Many grandparents have bought the book because they are now looking after their grandchildren when their parents are at work, Petrie said.

Petrie's father, Jack Miley, a retired Rye firefighter who now lives in Bucks County, sometimes cooks with Petrie's children and is featured in "Picture Me Cooking."

"Families can pass it down as an heirloom for future generations," Petrie said of the book.

More importantly, according to co-author Colleen Kennedy, the book will encourage families to overcome the distractions of modern life and commit to what used to be a more common American tradition—family dinners.

"When we make eating as a family a priority, put the phones, Blackberrys and video games down and interact, we are showing that it's important," Kennedy said. "Many studies have shown what eating together as a family can do, everything from getting your kids to talk more to keeping kids off drugs. It's important and it starts with the parents."