Teeny-weeny chefs whip up treats for family and friends

The project for the evening is miniature blueberry muffins.

The ingredients having been assembled, the duties delegated by chef Maile and the directions repeated (in fine English accent a la Pepa Pig) by chef Kiliohu, what is required now is for chef U‘i to sift the flour.

Just as soon as someone lifts chef U‘i onto the counter.

It’s a typical evening for the Ing-Lee family and, in particular, for the pint-size “patissiers” known among family and friends as the Teeny Weeny Baking Wahine.

Starting with eldest sister, Maile, 9, each of the girls learned the joy of baking at the hip of mom Brittny Ing-Lee, each begging their way into “helping” to make cookies and cobblers before they were tall enough to see over the spoon drawer.

But it wasn’t until their grandparents’ kitchen upstairs was remodeled to include a double-oven range and broad counter space that the sisters’ love of baking fully blossomed.

“It’s all they want to do,” said Ing-Lee. “They don’t even watch TV shows anymore. They only watch kids cooking videos on YouTube.”

The lessons are worth their weight in brown sugar. What Maile learns about fractions in her fourth-grade class at Manoa Elementary is put into practice with Grammy Ing’s measuring cups. Likewise, 5-year-old Kiliohu gets to practice basic math and reading while 2-year-old U‘i hones her manual dexterity and learns to appreciate the palatal differences between frosting and lard. But the most valuable lessons are self-intuited.

In recent months the three mousse-keteers have collaborated on all manner of confection, spending hours measuring, mixing, folding and portioning — but curiously little time actually sampling their creations.

“We give them to my cousins and friends and people from church,” said Kiliohu. “I want to be nice to people who give things to me, so I give them something that we made.”

This past Christmas, Santa left the princess dolls in the sled in favor of cooking utensils, baking sheets, cookbooks and a doughnut-hole maker, ensuring a sweet bounty for the girls’ favorite people.

And as their skills grow, so, too, do their ambitions.

Blueberry muffins? Kid stuff.

“I want to make blueberry meringue,” Maile said. “The more complicated, the better.”

Bravo!

Congratulations to Tyler Ramos (808ne.ws/1ZhqRDq), who won the Young Artist-Piano division of the Music Teachers National Association Southwest Division Competition in Tempe, Ariz., last week. With the win, Ramos moves on to the national finals in San Antonio in April.

Reach Michael Tsai at mtsai@staradvertiser.com.