Americans are lazy cooks

[Dogonthebed]

I’m an avid Pinterest collector of recipes. I see something I like the look of then pin to that’s week meal plan only to find out it is an American recipe Recipe stretching it as they seem to have shortcuts for everything we can’t get in the UK. Can they actually cook? It is the equivalent of us making a cottage pie from a Coleman mix. Anyone else find it bizarre how much help they get for basic recipes then having the cheek to set up a blog as recipes??? They could just read the back of the instructions fgs!

Huh? What a weird sweeping statement.

There are plenty of good American cooks and there are plenty of American cooks who use convenience products, just the same as British people do. I especially like American bloggers for plant based recipes.

I know what you mean, like adding a can of mushroom soup to a casserole, and whatever hamburger helper is

What, every single one?

Isn’t that a, er, lazy statement?

I agree. I spent a lot.g time living in the USA everything is processed , ingredients ti make " homemade" food is from can's and packets.

Horribly processed

Oh my god as soon as I click on a recipe and read the words
"A tablespoon of butter"
Or "2 cups of heavy cream"
I run a mile.

Not because I don't like cream or butter, it's not that, it's who on earth uses a tablespoon to measure butter?? - American cooks. That's who.
And I don't use cups I use grams. Actual measurements.

I have seen these videos. It will say “Best Ever Chocolate Cake From Scratch!” And it’s a woman with a box cake mix, a tub of pre made frosting and a bag of Hershey kisses.

Or the “Homemade Pasta Bake” that is a box of Kraft Mac and cheese with fried mince and frozen peas stirred in.

Lots of Americans are fantastic cooks, it is just that there are a lot of videos of recipes from there that aren’t really recipes.

Totally agree, I'm American. Dump cakes, cream of mushroom soup in everything, onion soup mix. I'm on a lot of weaning Facebook groups and the Americans are often making horribly processed food for their kids and have no idea what to cook. I'm a rubbish cook and American to boot but even I can make a lasagne, fish pie, white sauce, etc.

I find it swings from absolutely everything made from scratch to just assembling a meal/dish with cans and packets of things.

America is awash with processed and convenience food so yeah, that has affected what they eat and how they prepare food. It's seriously gross. But the UK isn't exactly a beacon of nutrition.

I saw that one. It was mix a tin condensed mushroom soup, with a tin of tuna and add it to cooked egg noodles and stir= Tuna casserole. 🤪

Agree. Making a cake involves a box of cake mix

Recipes seem to involve garlic and onion powder rather than the fresh ingredients.

We’re all the same, every single one of us. Lazy bastard cooks we all are.

Where are you from? UK? Is it ok if I think you’re all really stupid based on your post?

Bit of a sweeping statement.
I do find the use of branded seasoning odd though. Like everything has something like ‘two spoons of Old Hanks all purpose seasoning’ or ‘a quart of little Betsy Cajun sauce’.

Last night on TT I watched a video of someone tipping pineapple into a bowl, adding jelly crystals and cool whip and calling it some sort of salad!😂

I do see some genuine recipes on there tbf, but many make cakes using a box mix and meals with packet stuff. Pp is right though, the U.K. is getting pretty bad now too.

• Not everything!

In the 50s American food companies started creating heavily processed ingredients to help working mothers who didn’t have time to cook from scratch. American women haven’t had the kind of maternity benefits that European women have had and they went back to work fairly quickly. It’s a cultural difference, definitely not laziness. Indeed, many American women don’t understand the idea of a year of mat leave followed by 18 years of collecting child benefit and working part time.

Not lazy, it comes from historical necessity, its a huge land mass and fresh food was difficult or impossible to transport over long distances until relatively recently. In the middle of the States, you can be miles from a handy grocery store. Processed food is the natural go to that many have grown up with over a few generations.

I think if your look in the average British trolley at the supermarket you will see a great many boxes of ultra processed ‘food’.

I read an article on this exact point recently and the history of it - can't remember where though. It's based on the idea that the cook still has to do something so it's still homemade . As an aside my American husbands favourite meal is tuna noodle casserole.

Totally agree
I wanted to buy a baking book when i was in US and despite going to a lovely book shop with shelves of cook books, every one i looked at said take a packet of cake mix.
Trying to google Bundt cake recipes the majority are take a cake mix. I did finally find a nice bundt cake book called Kiss My Bundt by Crysta Wilson which has proper recipes.

You lost it, by mentioning UPS, just the latest fad for people with food issues.

I think they do cooking to extremes. Either proper all the pans cooking or mixing a tin of this and a packet of that. Or just buy take out.

I think some of this stems from parts of the country having climate extremes that make obtaining fresh fruit and veg quite difficult and expensive for much of the year (think about how crap it would be here in January if we didn't import stuff) so there is a heavy reliance in preserved food.

Is it late night denigrate Americans and those who suffer with food issues?

Yeah! I agree it sounds like a weird sweeping statement, and of course there are lots of good American cooks who combine basic ingredients, as one would expect.

For everyday household cooking, though, the US definition of "cooking" seems different. Ingredients that are pre-combined in factories are widely used, with no acknowledgement of corner-cutting and zero attempt to make the same dish from scratch. As OP says, we wouldn't proudly share a recipe made by emptying cans & packets into the pan.

Where do you think the worry about UPFs comes from? To make matters worse (for Americans), American ready-made foods are much more highly processed than their UK/EU analogues.

I've got to say, though - I'm having trouble learning to use my multi-cooker well, because so many of the recipes involve jars of pasta or curry sauces! Maybe the American manufacturer (Ninja) has found a way to make its users think of Lloyd Grossman as the pinnacle of culinary expertise 🤔