To feel that sad that basic cooking skills are dying out

Nonsense, loads watch a tik tok or YouTube or one of the billion programs on TV. People may be choosing to not cook and outsourcing, which I do during the week because it saves me time.

It is cheaper to outsource some evening meals, it saves me head space, planning and prep time and amd ensures portion control.

My 16 year old can cook very well and the ten year old lad is getting there. Most of the eldest year do home economics and our together a vegan treat cook book as part of their enterprise module.

@AllProperTeaIsTheft Exactly! It isn't exactly quantum mechanics!

I'm under no illusion that it's uncommon for people never to cook from scratch. What I find odd is how many people apparently would like to, but throw up their hands and say 'Sadly, I never learned, so I don't have the skills'. You can teach yourself pretty much anything from recipe books, and especially YouTube or even bloody TikTok. You don't have to start with complicated or expensive things.

Surely the vast majority of competent home cooks are mostly self-taught, even if they started off with a few pointers from their mum or in school?

I was a member of WI for a couple of years. All the others were more than 60 years old. Most of them had hardly any cooking skills. They did a cooking course for the WI members where they learned to roast a chicken ffs. I thought it would be a new an exciting recipe but it was as basic as can be. So happy I had other plans that day.

You know the cooking skills the staff had in that series where Jamie Oliver tried to ensure that school lunches were healthy food? Where most of them didn't even know how to slice veggies for a salad? Normal in Britain amongst people of all ages. My kids have had several friends who were surprised that we cook from scratch 95% of the time because their parents never ever did. Never ever. Never ever is normal in Britain.

So please don't start making up stories about young people "these days" don't know how to cook. Obviously neither did young people 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 or 60 years ago.

And before anyone start: No we didn't and don't live in a low income area with lots of social problems.

To everyone who thinks the OP is talking nonsense….

Im in my 40’s. Grew up on very healthy home cooking (both parents cooked). I have children. I have degrees and a professional career.

I don’t cook “from scratch” very much! Partly because I’m time poor but MAINLY because I lack confidence. It’s very annoying to space over something for half an hour only for it to not taste that nice.

I can cook various things well (my dc are eating risotto as I type - while in front of a cartoon I’m afraid). But cheese sauce is tricky (I don’t know why?!?) and so my macaroni cheese often goes wrong.

Baking is easy (for me). But even easy things like dahl often don’t taste great when I make them.

And I’m one of the old people who actually had cookery lessons at school!

But yeah, I’d actually benefit from a basics cooking course. Wondering about taking my children to one “for their benefits” (but really also for mine).

So OP, I believe you and I see this all the time anecdotally with people on low incomes who I work with. But us middle class people can be clueless too (I think a main problem for me is we have a variety of allergies in our house and some quite fussy eaters too - lasagne for example would not be popular with my children (although they love the ingredients separately)

My mum tried her damnedest to inspire me into enjoying cooking but as I was such an oppositional little toad it just made me resent cooking more. Now in my thirties I've discovered I enjoy it, purely because I've had so many disappointing takeaways in my twenties and wanted to be able to eat delicious food every night!

For anyone wanting a good curry, I highly recommend this book: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Madhur-Jaffreys-Ultimate-Curry-Bible/dp/0091874157

I think some obstacles to cooking today involve:

• upfront costs of stocking up spices/herbs/canned goods etc (hint: you don't need all the ingredients! Feel free to look up substitutes for ingredients you don't have, or modify recipes to avoid buying something for just one dish)
• anxiety about getting the dish wrong or putting effort in for a mediocre outcome (hint: it takes a few times of making a dish to calibrate it to your personal preference, write down your modifications on the recipe book/card so you remember for next time!)
• feeling time poor (nb: I've found that cooking from scratch still takes less time than the average delivery, however obviously isn't as easy as throwing a pizza into the oven)

My parents always cooked from scratch but I still lived off noodles and frozen food as a student. I just don't enjoy cooking in the slightest even though I can cook (and bake) fairly well.

It's like sausages and mash - not a terribly complicated meal. But one I don't make very often any more because frankly, it is a faff. I have to peel the potatoes, cook the potatoes, mash the potatoes, grill the sausages while carefully keeping an eye on them so they don't burn, then make some kind of gravy or sauce AND some veg on the side. Chopping up a big pile of vegetables, slicing some meat/or chicken and doing a quick stir fry with some wok noodles or rice and a "sauce" of lime juice and soy is a lot easier and less faff.

I wouldn't consider it much less faff tbh. I cook my sausages in the oven though, which helps. Do for quite a bit of the total time, the sausages are sitting in the oven and the potatoes are just getting on with boiling. Chopping a big pile of vegetables takes a while.

Mash is the ultimate faff! Peeling, chopping, boiling then mashing....I absolutely can't be bothered. I sound really lazy here! I actually don't mind spending time cooking but if I spend a long time making something I like it to be exciting and extra tasty...not boring old mash potato.

I bloody love mashed potato! Lots of butter and pepper and a bit of nutmeg!

I went to uni in 2000 and there was a guy who lived in pot noodles and a guy who was going stews, pot roasts, full dinners etc. Like always, it's about what parents have prioritised. It isn't a new phenomenon

Mash is the ultimate faff! Peeling, chopping, boiling then mashing....I absolutely can't be bothered. I sound really lazy here! I actually don't mind spending time cooking but if I spend a long time making something I like it to be exciting and extra tasty...not boring old mash potato.

It reminds me of school dinners in the nineties. It's not something I would ever think to cook or order in a restaurant.

It's also a massive hassle to make properly and takes forever.

I think as a rule, dishes that involve quite a lot of time and effort are considered old fashioned. So it's absolutely true that lasagna and cauliflower cheese are still popular, but I am not sure they're done as often - they're time consuming, have lots of different elements etc. Plus, I think a lot of people make an effort to make their food less heavy, which of course, cuts out anything with a cheese sauce as a rule!

It's like sausages and mash - not a terribly complicated meal. But one I don't make very often any more because frankly, it is a faff. I have to peel the potatoes, cook the potatoes, mash the potatoes, grill the sausages while carefully keeping an eye on them so they don't burn, then make some kind of gravy or sauce AND some veg on the side. Chopping up a big pile of vegetables, slicing some meat/or chicken and doing a quick stir fry with some wok noodles or rice and a "sauce" of lime juice and soy is a lot easier and less faff.

I sometimes do schnitzels with a cheese sauce. We all like it. But it's about a million calories per portion, involves at least 2 pots and one pan, boards etc etc etc. It's definitely more hassle.

I wouldn't make lasagne on a week night (unless I'd made the ragu in advance).The others don't take very long though. I was just making the point that there are certainly dishes very much still in favour which use a white sauce. Sadly I don't make them any more, as I've become intolerant to most dairy!

I find it relaxing to make so do it quite a bit
But I live alone and make 6-8 portions and freeze it so a homemade ready meal!

Lasagne is a huge faff. Making a ragu, then the white sauce, then assembling it and baking it in the oven. I rarely make it. I don't find the reward is worth the effort

How is lasagne old fashioned or macaroni cheese?
I make a béchamel pretty regularly

I thought of this thread when I unpacked my Tesco delivery just now. The Spirit of Mumsnet has obviously decided to punish me for my inadequacies. I thought I had ordered a pot of fresh lentil and vegetable soup, but in fact I have been sent a bag of chopped veg and lentils. OK, not really cooking "from scratch" as I haven't chopped the veg myself but I'm going to have to do more than shove the pot in the microwave!
It's obviously my penance for not spending enough time in the kitchen...or doing my own shopping...😂

A judgy OP I think. There's far more to be sad about I think.

I can cook, but don't enjoy it. I still cook something from scratch every day. Everyone I knows does the same. Actually I don't think I've taught my dc how to make a bechemal sauce but they can all cook, and the ones that have gone to university cook more than I do these days.

My teens all cook things from tiktok that look revolting.

I'm not a fan of fish with white sauces generally - and I cook tonnes of fish.

However I make a parsley sauce with baked ham and it is absolutely to die for.

I don't think there's necessarily anything old fashioned about either of those. They are absolute staples in my house along with a wide range of other cuisines.

Once people get confident in their abilities, they tend to be versatile with all kinds of food - in my experience at least.

Fish in parsley sauce not being old fashioned 🤣🤣🤣

Tbf, my two young adult dc can cook really well, and so do the dc of my friends. They all went away to uni, maybe that's why - they had no choice.

What dishes is it the basis for?

because I can bet you’re about to list a load of old fashioned dishes - cauliflower cheese, macaroni cheese, bread sauce etc etc

I can cook all those things but it's very rare that I do. They are very time consuming. I think nowadays lots of women work and have access to food and recipes that are much quicker to prep and cook. You can make meals with fresh ingredients that are much quicker and easier especially on a weeknight.