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AIBU?

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Original poster

To wonder how someone can reach their early 20's without being able to even boil an egg?

181 replies

IceCreamAngel · 08/12/2014 08:46

Just that really. I could boil an egg at about eight years old! By the time I was 10/11 I could fry bacon and heat up some soup, spaghetti or baked beans on the hob. I could also operate a microwave to prepare myself a ready meal. It wasn't of my parents making me do it either. I wanted to do it all myself, and once I could their response would always be, "ok well you know where everything is".

So quite frankly I'm disturbed that there are young adults out there who can't even manage the most basic of life skills. How the fuck is that even possible? It's appalling and quite sad really.

OP posts:
DoraGora · 08/12/2014 14:02

To be fair, chandler, if you can cook pasta, then you probably don't count as a non-cook.

Notcontent · 08/12/2014 14:17

I haven't read the whole thread, but I think the OP was using a boiled egg as just an example. I think the point is that so many people nowadays can't cook at all - it's not that they aren't good cooks, but actually have no idea about any basics.

People often say in response that they don't have time or the desire to cook and are happy to just live on ready meals. There are lots of problems with that approach:

  • people who have no idea about cooking usually have a pretty weak understanding of what ingredients go into foods, etc so it is difficult for them to have a balanced diet;
  • even expensive ready meals are full of crap - bad fats, to much salt and sugar, additives;
  • if you are on a low income and can't cook, you are pretty much stuffed.
goodasitgets · 08/12/2014 14:29

I learnt nothing in food tech. Mainly picked stuff up from hanging around pub kitchens and watching parents cook. Now I google if I'm not sure. Still ring dad "I've bought this, wtf do I do with it, it was reduced to 20p" Grin

Fallingovercliffs · 08/12/2014 14:42

TheChandler ignoring your rather childish comments above; why is it either or? Cooking is a basic skill and is equally useful whether you're a brain surgeon or a housewife.

Laquitar · 08/12/2014 15:45

I think many people forget that it is not about liking or not eggs it is about being able to look after yourself. Cooking, cleaning your enviroment, washing your clothes. It is linked to self esteem, thats why it is good to teach children to do these stuff. This is the reason they teach people with learning or physical difficulties to do them. It is actually a right.

Fallingovercliffs · 08/12/2014 15:53

Also, circumstances change and just because someone can afford to buy ready prepared food now; or only has their own diet to think of at the moment, doesn't mean that will always be the case.
If people suddenly find themselves on a tight budget after a redundancy or somesuch it is really important that they have a grasp of home economics and realise that it is far far cheaper to cook basic meals at home, chop and peel their own vegetables, make their own sauces and soups etc than to buy them ready made; and also have the basic skills to do this.

DoraGora · 08/12/2014 16:03

Having a family to feed is another reason.

Original poster
IceCreamAngel · 08/12/2014 16:40

TheChandler, I can see I've hit a raw nerve with you haven't I? Your obviously not as bright as you clearly think you are if you can't see that I was speaking in the broadest terms. If you leave home unable to do even the most basic cookery then your parents have failed you, and you will fail your kids if you also don't equip the with these skills.

You might be happy feeding your kids packets of shit because you find cooking beneath you, but I'd much rather ensure that my kids get healthy and nutritious meals.

OP posts:
TheChandler · 08/12/2014 16:49

IceCreamAngel TheChandler, I can see I've hit a raw nerve with you haven't I? Your obviously not as bright as you clearly think you are if you can't see that I was speaking in the broadest terms. If you leave home unable to do even the most basic cookery then your parents have failed you, and you will fail your kids if you also don't equip the with these skills.

Yes, you are right. I'm just too stupid to eat.

Seriously, how many people can't read (if they can't work it out) the instructions on the packet of pasta?

We're not exactly discussing how to make your own pasta.

Who exactly is trying to make doing something so ordinary into a virtue and labelling people unable to look after themselves?

My guess is that, when faced with a goody-goady schoolmarm type asking if they know how to boil an egg or heat up tinned soup, many become facetious and make up answers, quietly laughing to themselves that the questioner is taking them seriously.

DoraGora · 08/12/2014 17:06

What is this argument about? How can anyone get offended by the concept of cooking? I know that some computer geniuses live on Pepsi and Pizza. But, I don't think they laugh at people who can cook (or who cook the pizza.)

NuggetofPurestGreen · 08/12/2014 17:16

For people struggling with boiled eggs, Delia is your friend.

www.deliaonline.com/recipes/cuisine/european/english/soft-boiled-eggs.html

Ragwort · 08/12/2014 17:24

Chandler I can assure you that there are plenty of people who genuinely can't rustle up a simple, basic meal.

I volunteer in a food bank and a lot of people really only want Pot Noodles or microwaveable food (and I know some don't have cooking facilities - but this doesn't apply to everyone). We get given loads of fresh veg and fruit from local allotments etc and most of it goes to waste - although some of us 'do gooder' volunteers will take it home and make pies/cakes etc to give out.

When I do collections for the FB I now ask for tinned meals, Pot Noodles etc.

WyrdByrd · 08/12/2014 17:27

It's not a new thing - my friend's DH is in his 40's and can't manage a ready meal in the microwave!

DoraGora · 08/12/2014 17:29

It wouldn't surprise me that people on the existence threshold are asking for the easiest food in the world to warm up. If you're in B&B or sleeping on a friend's floor, three bags of flour, a dozen eggs and a veg box aren't your friend.

FindoGask · 08/12/2014 17:35

I couldn't really cook when I left home for university. I'd maybe boiled an egg, I'm not sure. I could peel potatoes and grate cheese and make a sandwich, but that's about it.

I learned to cook when I began living on my own, as I'm sure many people do. My mum and dad were both working full time. When mum cooked it was a chore to be got over with as quickly as possible with everyone else out of the kitchen. When dad cooked on the weekends, he clearly enjoyed it more but again, it was a solitary pastime for him and not one he had any interest in teaching. My parents didn't fail me; they did their best, and I turned out fine.

I'm 36 - not knowing how to cook when you leave home is not a new thing. Lots of my friends were the same too, and many of us cook now. This isn't another example of society going to the dogs

WittyUsername102 · 08/12/2014 17:38

I wouldn't consider boiling an egg a basic life skill.. no one in this house eats egg, so why would any of us need to know how to? I don't see how it is failing my children..

FindoGask · 08/12/2014 17:40

I want to add - I've always loved cooking since I started teaching myself, it has been an abiding joy to me. Since I started working full time too it makes me sad that I don't get to spend as long in the kitchen as I used to, though I still make big feasts at weekends and bake as much as I can. So some of my dad's enthusiasm has passed on to me anyway, and food is one of the few things we can talk endlessly about now.

FindoGask · 08/12/2014 17:42

"You might be happy feeding your kids packets of shit because you find cooking beneath you, but I'd much rather ensure that my kids get healthy and nutritious meals."

Also, this is a particularly foul post and you should be ashamed of yourself.

DoraGora · 08/12/2014 17:45

findo I don't think you can pull out just one line of that argument and have a go at it. Both sides are arguing about something strange. And are winding each other up, too.

TheChandler · 08/12/2014 17:47

Thank goodness for some common sense FindoGask. Exactly the same here. My parents would be hurt and horrified to learn some random on the internet had labelled them abusive because they had failed to teach their daughter to boil an egg, but instead encouraged her interest in sport and for her to pass exams to get into a good university course.

I cannot honestly believe the OP thinks there are a sizeable number of people out there who (a) cannot work out how to empty a tin of soup into a pan and switch on the hob and (b) that doing this is somehow cooking. Now, if someone asked me if I could make a nice casserole from scratch, I would say no, I could learn, yes, and follow instructions, but its something you have to be doing regularly for a household or to have a special interest in cooking for. But to be honest, for me, life is too short to be spent slaving over a cooker.

DoraGora · 08/12/2014 17:56

Making a casserole is not slaving over the cooker. That's the whole point of a casserole; you put it in the oven and off you go.

Laquitar · 08/12/2014 18:02

TheChandler
I can not understand from your posts if you have learnt how to cook in adult life or are you saying that you dont cook at all? If so what do you eat (just curious)

Putthatonyourneedles · 08/12/2014 18:11

I posted on my Facebook group asking for advice on how to get my 10yo to bring me get washing/tidy her room. Omg the amount of people who claim that a 10yo doing these chores is the same as starving them and beating them bloody.

Apparently as her mother I am supposed to do all these things and more for her, otherwise it's abusive and she is only a child once.

Sorry but I don't want to be receiving phone calls when she is at uni because she can't work the washing machine or has no cooking skills.

DoraGora · 08/12/2014 18:13

Fresh from the House of Lords, the poor can't cook!
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-30386108

TheChandler · 08/12/2014 18:13

I eat food Laquitar. I don't think its that hard to understand in this modern day and age where we can get food in various forms, from a variety of sources.

Some posters have got their knickers in a twist about parents not "teaching their children to cook" and mistaken it for disinterest and lack of motivation in cooking.

You really want me to list everything I eat?? That would take too long. I eat a lot of fish, either smoked, poached or baked (I don't eat fried food), with either potatoes, rice or pasta, and a sauce. Half and half I will prepare it myself from basic ingredients (including vegetables), the other half of the time I will buy a ready meal or just heat up some supermarket pasta and a sauce. I don't make soup, I would buy it from the supermarket. I could do, if I wanted to, but as I say above, life is too short and there are other ways I would choose to spend my time, which to me are more fun.

There was no particular "learning" process involved in the above - I would say its just how nearly everyone manages when they leave home to go off to uni at 18.

I guess the OP would classify me as being a non-cook, and I would tend to agree, except that if forced, I would simply YouTube it or read the instructions. But I get the impression that some posters, including the OP, are making the "ability" to do this to be something far more difficult and rare than it actually is, and for some reason using it as a stick to beat others up with, so they can feel superior.