Christine Mackstaller
Co-Founder

christine@stickyfingerscooking.com

Christine is Sticky Fingers’ culinary whiz. She has been cooking on her own since she was six when she and her friend Heather would go into Heather’s kitchen and experiment, once whipping up peanut butter and raisin popsicles!

Luckily, her skill has improved over the years, and her love of cooking prompted her to include her daughter Cleo in the kitchen from a very young age. Christine’s repertoire of Cleo-friendly recipes has grown rich, and Cleo now loves toting her stool around the kitchen so she can be right there in the thick of it!

A self-proclaimed “foodie,” all things culinary are Christine’s true love. Watching other parents, grand-parents and care-givers spend time together in Sticky Fingers Cooking classes has cemented her belief that good food prepared with those you love is one of life’s most nurturing and nourishing opportunities.

Samantha Sturhahn
Co-Founder

samantha@stickyfingerscooking.com

Sam is Sticky Fingers’ sustainability champion. After completing her MBA in corporate social responsibility, Sam developed environmentally preferable food and packaging policies for multinational restaurant companies. When her daughter Lilly was born, Sam realized how hard it was to live by her professional values – eating in a nutritious and environmentally responsible yet affordable way – at home. Whether she’d spent the day at work or with her daughter, Sam struggled to find time to plan and prepare meals that everyone would eat, and found herself relying on toys or the TV to keep Lilly occupied long enough for her to get supper on the table.

One night when Lilly was two and underfoot during dinner preparation, she asked to sample raw onion – and loved it! Sam began to think that the answer to her nightly dinnertime challenge was not keeping Lilly out of the kitchen, but finding ways to invite her in to help. About this time, she met Angie and Christine, and together they began to develop Sticky Fingers Cooking.

While continuing to cherish time in the kitchen with Lilly and the students in Sticky Fingers’ classes, Sam has also admitted to a secret love of spreadsheets. Whether hunting for recipes that include affordable ingredients or balancing the books at the end of the month, Sam is passionate about making sure Sticky Fingers techniques, recipes and suggestions for eating sustainably are practical for busy families.

Angie Mielke, Ph.D.
Co-Founder

angie@stickyfingerscooking.com

Angie is Sticky Fingers’ child development specialist. With a PhD in Psychology, and a research focus on childhood obesity, self-esteem development, and parent-child feeding styles, Angie understood the power that positive experiences with food can have on healthy self-esteem development in children. After completing her Ph.D. Angie thought she was officially finished with school! However, her life-long passion for learning, facilitating the development of positive self-images in children, and promoting nutritious food choices soon led her back to the classroom, but this time one filled with toddlers!

Angie’s love of cooking began at home with her mom who often encouraged her to experiment in the kitchen and take pride in her culinary accomplishments. Angie’s earliest memory of cooking was whipping up her family’s Saturday morning pancake breakfast before the rest of the family awoke. Today, Angie wakes up to her husband and three year-old daughter, Mattiline, continuing this tradition.

Never in her wildest imagination did Angie envision applying her Ph.D. to a cooking school for toddlers! But Angie’s skills in understanding children’s developmental needs and her passion for family pancake breakfasts all come together in this venture. Angie feels great about the memories she’s making with her own daughter, knowing that she’s positively influencing her family’s love of healthy eating, and is excited about the positive influence that Sticky Fingers Cooking has on the children and families it serves.

In creating the curriculum for Sticky Fingers Cooking’s Parent-Tot classes, Angie injected a healthy dose of opportunity for creativity, imagination and self-expression by young chefs, while encouraging parents to throw caution to the wind and include their toddlers in meal preparation.