To think that cooking isn’t hard...

[CrabappleBiscuit]

....as long as you are physically fit and not unwell and don’t have a disability that makes it hard, and have access to a kitchen and equipment (disclaimer)

Friends who say they or their partners ‘can’t cook’. But hold down jobs, drive cars and can put together flat pack furniture.

It’s not rocket science, read a recipe and do it. I like cooking and I’m good at it, dh isn’t a great cook but he still cooks a fairly limited repertoire but he does.

Is it just laziness?

I think everyone can learn to cook basic food sufficiently well enough to not poison themselves. But not everyone can cook well, for that you need to be greedy and really love food.

DH can cook and does so regularly. He is not lazy. But I grew up in a foodie household and am probably more obsessed with food than most people I know. I have hundreds of cookbooks. I think about food a lot. DH doesn't and he doesn't cook with his senses, he cooks just with his head and he makes mistakes because he doesn't pick up changes in colour, texture, smell and sound as he cooks. He also doesn't care as much about food as I do. To him it's fuel and if I didn't live with me he'd forget to eat a lot and would eat only very repetitive meals. For me a bad meal (or even worse a missed meal) affects my mood. I need good food regularly and so being able to cook was a priority when I was younger.

Most of the problems the “bad” cooks on here are talking about would be cured instantly by buying a probe thermometer. I’m a good and experienced cook, but I still use one for some things.

One that’s really simple to use, like Kitchen Cooking Thermometer, Digital Multi-functional Food Thermometer with Instant Read, Long Probe, Backlit LCD Screen, Best for Food, Meat, Grill, BBQ, Milk, and Water (Battery Included) [[https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01GCEY2IS/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_i_T4WbBbCK5CA2G?tag=mumsnetforum-21 this]]

Or this

Lack of inclination rather than ability.

Like me and tidying.

I hate cooking. So so much. I can cook and I'm sure I'd be better at it if I had to do it more often but I don't, so I hate it. I quite regularly have weeks where I only eat 3 or 4 times at home and often not even that.

My oven is crap too, if I had an oven that maintained a temperature and wasn't hit and miss I'd do loads more cooking.

I'm a good baker though.

Cooking for one also sucks a lot, and I am disinclined to 'batch cook' often. I'm out of the house for 10 hours a day for work, knackered at the end of it, I don't want to spend my exhausted evening in the kitchen.

I really try but i am awful at it. Everythig ends up either burnt or undercooked. But i can do basic things like burgers, spag bol and shepherds pie, fish (microwaved), eggs, roast dinner, sausages.
But i have got a slow cooker now and am trying to do one new receipe a week in it- so far have mastered slow cooker 8 hr spag bol and a beef stew. Going to try and do some basic chicken breasts next week.
I alao struggle as its just me and my 3 year old snd i am not cofident enough to warm
Up left overs that have been frozen. But i’m getting there.

“Everythig ends up either burnt or undercooked.“

Probe thermometer. Sorted.

“am not cofident enough to warm
Up left overs that have been frozen”

Probe thermometer. Sorted.

I think the bit about knowing what something should taste like is underestimated.

I'm a good cook and really like Asian (Far East) foods, but I can't really afford to go and eat in decent restaurants so it's really hard to tell if what I've cooked is even remotely authentic. Obviously it might still taste nice so it isn't a massive issue.

Sushi is easy to make, but I know lots of people worry about making it and rolling it- I had a Japanese friend teach me so it made it a lot more accessible.

Now thinking about the people who weren't shown how to cook at home and were fed only convenience foods, yeah I can see it might take them awhile.

My DP is a lot like this, he's got awful taste buds as well so just tasting stuff doesn't seem to make much of a difference- I still expect him to cook sometimes and for him to bloody learn how! (I'm a SAHM so obviously I handle most of the cooking).

One thing that really surprised him was actually telling him how often I google and double check stuff if I'm not sure, he seemed to imagine he was somehow failing to cook if he had to check timings and that beforehand.

BertrandRussell now I want one and my budget for non essential stuff is gone for the week as I bought crafty stuff.

Cheshire - it will save you sooo much money, I promise you. When I've got a moment, I'll link to a list of what the internal temperature should be of loads of stuff when it's cooked

I think that the vast majority of recipes are incredibly fussy and have large numbers of non-essential ingredients which makes them intimidating to new cooks.

Once you've been cooking for a while you get used to leaving bits out because you don't have them, or substituting with what you do have, and you know that it will be fine. When you don't have that experience it's easy to worry. Who wants to put themselves through that if they don't have to?

I remember the first time I cooked for myself. I followed the pasta packet instructions to the letter and it ended up tasting vile, because of course my mother never added salt to the boiling water, so I wasn't used to it, there was too much, and I might have well used seawater.

It's just like any skill. You get better with practice. But you have to eat those first few disasters and I could see why that would put a lot of people off.

I can't cook. I was never taught by my Mum as she hates cooking so we just ate freezer food

I only had 8 weeks of cooking lessons at school and we only learned various biscuits

I can read and follow a recipe but it always turns out horrible/barely edible and I'm notorious for burning things

I can microwave ready meals and cook frozen stuff in the oven but cooking from scratch is invariably a disaster!

Luckily my husband loves cooking so he cooks every night and I do the cleaning. I do offer to cook but he won't eat my food (& I don't blame him)

CountFosco, that's interesting about how you have to be greedy and/or love food to cook well.

I absolutely love food and, yes I hate to say it, but I am greedy. I watch just about every cookery programme going. I have tons of cookery books (did have loads more but recently moved house and got rid of quite a lot). I get cookery books out of the library and sit and read them almost like I would fiction!

I think about food a lot - too much really and I am trying to lose weight at the moment so trying hard not to. While eating breakfast I am thinking what to have for lunch and tea.

DH is not quite as bad as me but he does love food too. We both love cooking and want our meals to be as tasty as possible even fairly ordinary meals such as shepherds pie (we are both vegetarian so like to vary it using different lentils and veg).

We have more or less given up eating out as so many times we have been disappointed with meals and know we could have made better.

Also I think for me I like the fact that cooking is something that I can do and do pretty well. I can't sing or play a musical instrument. I can't paint or draw. I can't do anything really other than cook

YABU - I say I can’t cook and my family light heartedly agree. BUT I do cook - breakfast, lunch and dinner everyday for for the whole family. I’m not good at it and I don’t like it but I still do it - but it doesn’t change the fact I’m not very good at it. The fact you like it makes a difference - people who like things are usually at least ok at them.

I would agree not being able to cook is a choice, just like not being able to drive or swim is a choice. There is a degree of skill and practice involved (and I mean 'cook' as in from scratch) and it's perfectly legitimate to decide not to learn, but most people are physically and mentally capable of learning if they choose to.

On the other hand 'I can't cook' doesn't mean someone can't prepare a perfectly palatable meal and should get away with doing nothing in the kitchen, I wouldn't say my 10 year old 'can cook' (as he can't prepare and chop all veg properly, prepare meat safely, bake a cake / bread unsupervised, make pastry or sauces) BUT he can make pasta, scrambled eggs, beans on toast, put a pizza in the oven so would be perfectly capable of feeding himself / Others if the need arose.

My MIL is a good cook. My FIL can't cook. Well he could if he got a delia recipe and followed it. But he doesn't. If she left him I think he's just be round at ours for all his meals. He doesn't seem capable of putting some fish under the grill, boiling some spuds and steaming some veg.....

Also depends who you are cooking for. I used to cook for a partner and family and really enjoyed making nice meals/baking etc. Now I live alone and have a partner who only likes burned meat and everything as plain as possible. No sauces, no cheese, no eggs, nothing you could remotely describe as a 'recipe'. Basically a slab of meat heated until it's black.

And it's put me right off cooking, full stop. I never bake for myself. Plus I work in a supermarket, buy whatever is going out of date when I finish my shift, and heat that up. I might now have lost my cooking mojo.

I kind of agree with you. Everyone has the ability to be able to cook SOMETHING. Even a simple veggie pasta with a tin of tomatoes and cheese on top. But people’s ability is different and I think this can separate people into those who are scared of failing and those who keep failing but continue trying anyway.

I'm a good cook but can't put together flat pack furniture! I think as long as people can put together normal day to day meals (spag bol, meat and 2 veg) its fine, not everyone has the 'knack' for everything.

Zombie thread.

I think it's quite common, people saying they can't cook, need a cleaner, can't possibly by expected to work once they have a child etc. Lots see, lazy and entitled and leave it to others.

That's not a valid comparison.

I don't know many people who say they need a cleaner, just that they benefit from having one. Mine does the job when I'm out of the house (couldn't be the case for cooking), and I pay her for it. I know how to clean my house, it just happens to be easy to outsource the task.

It's not the same as a husband 'leaving it' to an unpaid spouse to do because he 'doesn't know how'.

DPS banned from cooking for the family, no one will eat his offerings. I've never known anyone have the ability to turn perfectly edible ingredients into a vile mass the way he does.

He's allowed to cook for himself and will offer to cook for us but no one in their right mind would accept ............I'm still mentally scarred from the time I came home and thought he was being sick into a bowl. But no, the scrambled eggs he'd made himself had the smell and texture of vomit. Sets off my gag reflex just thinking about it. 🙄