It'll be fine (except that some kids won't appreciate it).

Won't hurt them. My Dad grew up in Russia with wine in his baby bottle! No joke!! :)

Strange, as an adult he was a non-drinker. Go figure. So much for any theories about developing a taste for alcohol, huh? lol

/tricia

I agree that it won't hurt them--if you don't let them drink the gravy right from the sauce boat they won't get enough alcohol to have an effect--but I've heard a lot recently that the alcohol doesn't actually burn off unless you set it on fire, and even then some is left behind. I don't know if that's true, but it's the current wisdom making the rounds.

this question has popped up recently-not sure if it was here or elsewhere. Here is one researcher's (term loosely used) results.
Jo

Here is a link that might be useful: how does alcohol cook out of food

plllog - I think the alcohol that's burning is that which has evaporated anyway, so I'm not buy that theory. Someone will probably post percentages of alcohol that cook off with different methods, and I believe flambe is about the least, and long simmer is the most. None 100%.

I'm sensitive to this topic, but personally my concern is not so much alcohol content itself as it is taste. I cook with wine and don't think twice, but I wouldn't give my kids balls. Difference being, rum balls taste like rum. I don't know if there's any validity to my concern, but that's the way I run.

I cook many things with wine or alcohol: I add rum to rum balls; I put cream de cacao in chocolate frosting and sprinkle it on chocolate cake before I frost it; I recently used vodka in a pie crust because Lindac swears by it; I braise beef in wine; I made Coq au vin once but didn't like it too much; I put wine in my spaghetti sauce and I pour wine over beef roasts near the end of the roasting time. I don't know how much of the alcohol burns off, but the results sure taste good.

Besides, if you're using 1 1/2 C wine in the whole pot, plus water (or broth), plus beef juices, how much gravy is your kid going to actually eat? Even if he LOVES gravy and NONE of the alcohol burns off, he's only going to have what - 1/4 C of gravy? And how much of that is alcohol? Not very much. So don't worry.

Sherry

It's very dangerous. Your kids will become gourmets at a young age and may then be difficult to please. ;-)

Jim

I'm kind of with Jim on this.

Lars

Be very careful. They may start watching Sandra Lee and start decorating the X-mas tree with bar glasses!

Duane

Yes, FOAS, your premise seems right according to Jo's researcher's table most of the flamed alcohol remains. So much for flambé! ;) I agree about the rum balls, rum cake, etc. Not for kids--who probably won't like the flavor anyway. Coq au vin, yes. I don't know about rum balls, but I think rum cakes actually have enough alcohol to get buzzed on.

12 oz. of wine, some of the alcohol cooked off, so not ultra strong wine, divided among four people? More? 5 oz. of wine, not considering any that might be cooked off, has 12-14 grams of alcohol according to a table I just found. So that's approx. 7 grams per serving before cooking, which is more or less half a drink.

Simmered for 15 minutes, according to Jo's table, reduces the amount of alcohol by 60%, giving you a fifth of a glass of wine per a quarter of the pot full. If the kids eat half portions, that's a tenth.

Sounds okay to me. You decide for your own family.

My kids eat wine in there food all the time I put it in my Sunday Gravy also...Id like to say a sip wouldnt hurt them....Italians give there kids wine..ask my hubby!

Roast turned out good -- gravy was yummy with the red wine in it.

Though, I have to wonder if eye of round is worth the $$$. Taste and texture very similar to chuck roast -- but at least you don't have dig through all that fat.

stir fryi,

Glad your roast was yum. About the chuck roast fat thing...

We recently switched to Whole Foods beef/chicken/pork products. We've had two chuck roasts & are amazed at the difference between WW's grass-fed, hormone free beef & what's available at the grocery store. WW's chuck roasts do not have all of that icky fat. There's enough for the meat to slow roast to a wonderful tenderness; but, when you slice the meat there's not that gloppy stuff to cut away & remove. Also, the flavor is incredible. It tastes like the beef my Dad used to buy when I was a kid...1/2 steer for our freezer. Anyway, really good stuff.

Here, grocery store chuck roast is $3.99/lb; eye of round is $4.99/lb.; & the WW's chuck roast is $5.99/lb. So, yes, it's more expensive per pound. But, there's so much less shrinkage & you're not tossing all of the gunky stuff so the cost difference isn't as large as it seems.

/tricia

Tricia - Just to clarify, by "WW" do you mean Whole Foods? It's commonly referred to as "Whole Paycheck," have you changed that to, perhaps, "Whole Wallet?"

FOAS, yikes! Another typo...yes (sigh), it's Whole Foods. My fingers don't work right after the stroke & typing is so darn hard. I'll get better...I promise!

/tricia

Oh for cryin' out loud! No offense intended toward any individual, but there is a faction of our society that has made us entirely too concerned about the Evils of Alcohol.

Children all over the world are given wine (diluted with water or not) from earliest infancy during religious ceremonies or simply as a part of a daily diet without the result of either physical damage or a future life of addiction and sordid bummery. (I invented a word!)

A full glass of wine, served to a child as often as one might give them beef simmered in it for dinner would cause them no problem worse than a headache in the morning, and that only if the child were very small and the wine glass very large.

Of course, I may be biased...I do LOVE a winey sauce, and have since I was a (hic) child. :D

I cook for some family who are alcoholics and I avoid cooking with it for that reason. Even the taste (and smell) with the alcohol cooked off is a distraction.

I'm one of the few who doesn't like wine, no matter how hard I've tried to like it, so I don't cook with it and it's not an issue, beer either.

The amount of alcohol a child would get in a roast cooked with wine is negligible, a far greater risk is having the bottle accessible to small children.

An eight year old would/should know better, but we had a toddler in this county nearly die of alcohol poisoning when she found a bottle of some fruit flavored liquor and drank it. Their much smaller body weights don't allow their bodies to tolerate very much higher proof alcohol. So, go ahead and cook with it, but keep it out of the kids' reach.

Frankly, there's probably more alcohol in the hand sanitizer or Nyquil that children use than there is in the bit of gravy on that roast, but whether or not to allow your child even that much alcohol is a personal choice that only a parent has the right to make, no matter if anyone else thinks it's silly or not.

Annie

Funny enough, my 8 year old is about to make her First Communion so she was very interested in the wine I was drinking with dinner last night. I told her I actually prefer she does not take wine at church -- not because I am opposed to the wine but I am opposed to the shared cup!

I agree with those who said it is up to each individual parent, no one else can or should try to make a decision about alcohol in kids' food.

And bumblebeez mentioned something that definitely should be taken into consideraton.

Alcoholism. It is hereditary. That is a known fact.

What is NOT known, is just when or how much alcohol can set off that gene in a person.

So, on the off chance that there is any of this disease in a family, it is best to consider very carefully whether or not to include alcohol in cooking.

Rusty