Kids Can Cook Anything!: The Complete How-To Cookbook for Young Chefs, with 75 Kid-Tested, Kid-Approved Recipes (Young Chefs Series)

Why it's worth it

This is a how-to manual with 75 recipes attached, not a recipe collection with tips sprinkled in. Every recipe went through America's Test Kitchen's kid-tester process, so the instructions are written for someone who has genuinely never done this before.

America's Test Kitchen tests its kids' recipes with actual kids, and that shows up on every page. The company revises each recipe until children across a range of skill levels get the same result. That sounds like marketing copy until you compare the instructions side by side with other books. Where a typical kids' cookbook says "cook the onions," this one tells you the pan size, the heat level, how long, and what the onions should look like when they're done.

The structure is the real selling point. It's built as a how-to first — equipment, ingredient prep, core techniques — and the recipes come after, so a kid learns the move before applying it. That order matters more than it sounds. A child who understands why you preheat a pan will adapt when something goes sideways. A child who only follows steps will freeze.

From our review of 7 children's cookbooks for ages 9 to 12

What we like

• +America's Test Kitchen tests its kids' recipes with actual kids, and that shows up on every page
• +The structure is the real selling point
• +Safety guidance is written into the recipes rather than quarantined on one page up front
• +It's also the least condescending book here

What to know

• –Seventy-five recipes is fewer than several books here, including the company's own Complete Cookbook
• –The binding is standard hardcover, not lay-flat or spiral