To think knowing about food and being able to cook are key life skills?

[Notcontent]

This is something I strongly believe in, but I think that notwithstanding various small-scale initiatives to teach young people and families about healthy cooking etc the lack of skills is getting worse not better.

I was listening to a Radio 4 programme the other day about child food poverty and they were talking to some young people - one of the teenage girls talked about the fact that until recently she couldn’t cook anything)no and I also had little idea of what a normal meal should be.

This seems such wide-spread problem. So many people think of food as being readymade, processed things that you unwrap and eat.

I think that there should be education about this at schools as obviously many people are not getting these skills at home. It’s so important - eating is what keeps are alive.

YANBU. Both my brother and I cook. Granted, the meal I had tonight was convenience food but I am planning to do a Thai curry later in the week to use up some green curry paste in my fridge. Mum was taught to cook by my grandma as a child, so she was very keen on us learning to cook and got us into baking when we were really little, and encouraged us to help out in the kitchen. I'd actually say my brother is a better cook than I am - he got as much encouragement as I did, it wasn't gendered. Both of us had a go at cooking meals and one thing I did in my gap year was learning how to shop. It really paid off when I started uni and had a load of cookbooks (and I was the only one in my flat with a garlic press). I couldn't have survived on takeaways and ready meals. It's not cheap.

That Angry Chef post was a good read. I'm very lucky when it comes to cooking - I really appreciate all the encouragement I got off both my mum and my grandma, who bought me a whisk for my birthday one year. I'm also lucky enough to have two excellent greengrocers near me that also sell lots of spices and ethnic foods. And I agree that it does help if you enjoy eating as much as cooking.

Totally agree! Was talking about this to MIL yesterday- I was making an apple & berry crumble (nothing fancy) but I didn’t need recipe as learnt how to bake such things in first year at school over 20 years ago. We did “home economics” until GCSE year. I loved it and am a very competent cook. Nothing gives me more pleasure than cobbling together a tasty healthy meal from what’s in the fridge. My boys are only 4 and 6 and already cook proper food with me

How did you know about learning to drive? How did you learn to drive? Was there a special book you were given about how people have to take lessons and book tests

I learned to drive because I saw my family driving.
My family didn’t cook and being in the care system on and off from 2 years old I was never around anyone who did cook.
I think at home we lived off burgers when it was my mothers turn to cook and with an eye on the price we would get the cheapest possible burgers around and throw potatoes into a vat of bubbling oil that was months old
Otherwise my aunties and uncles cooked potato curries which were pretty horrible as they would be reheated day after day and added to with more potato’s and more curry powder and more veg and rice that was always congealed.

Then I moved into a flat at 16 and Dp used take me out to eat or I didn’t eat anything other than a sandwich in the evening.

I still don’t get why not cooking means I don’t know what nutrition is.

I just don’t go anywhere near the cooker.

Personally I prefer a salad with bread, hummus or avocados I then have jars of sun dried tomatoes, olives and roasted veg in oil to anything that has come out of an oven or has been grilled or boiled that can’t be identified in its original form.

For most people on this thread I feel like you are berating me because I can’t cook and are saying I should never have been allowed to have children.
Then the same people say they learned to cook by watching family members or people showing them. Take away the family members and people who taught them and put yourself in the care system from 2 years old and you wouldn’t be much different to me.

The only difference would be if you really liked cooked food and wanted to learn how to cook it.
To me I don’t mind it but prefer salads and stuff that isn’t cooked.

I just don’t go anywhere near the cooker.

Why not? Are you afraid? Do you really not want to know how to cook a delicious meal? Do you never look at recipes or cookery shows or videos?

Do you not enjoy your food?

You can't change your awful past, but you shouldn't be projecting this on your children. Will they grow up with the very negative " I can't" attitude that you have?

I would judge you less if you said " I don't want to", but "I can't" is a pathetic excuse to not learn how to cook proper basic, nutritious meals with all the resources so readily available to show you how.

An old cookery teacher at school once said to me "the only thing you can't do is strike a match against a bar of soap"

@Oliversmumsarmy

How did you know about learning to drive? How did you learn to drive? Was there a special book you were given about how people have to take lessons and book tests

I learned to drive because I saw my family driving.
My family didn’t cook and being in the care system on and off from 2 years old I was never around anyone who did cook.
I think at home we lived off burgers when it was my mothers turn to cook and with an eye on the price we would get the cheapest possible burgers around and throw potatoes into a vat of bubbling oil that was months old
Otherwise my aunties and uncles cooked potato curries which were pretty horrible as they would be reheated day after day and added to with more potato’s and more curry powder and more veg and rice that was always congealed.

Then I moved into a flat at 16 and Dp used take me out to eat or I didn’t eat anything other than a sandwich in the evening.

I still don’t get why not cooking means I don’t know what nutrition is.

I just don’t go anywhere near the cooker.

Personally I prefer a salad with bread, hummus or avocados I then have jars of sun dried tomatoes, olives and roasted veg in oil to anything that has come out of an oven or has been grilled or boiled that can’t be identified in its original form.

For most people on this thread I feel like you are berating me because I can’t cook and are saying I should never have been allowed to have children.
Then the same people say they learned to cook by watching family members or people showing them. Take away the family members and people who taught them and put yourself in the care system from 2 years old and you wouldn’t be much different to me.

The only difference would be if you really liked cooked food and wanted to learn how to cook it.
To me I don’t mind it but prefer salads and stuff that isn’t cooked.

Apart from the ones who said they watched TV, read books, asked friends and found out for themselves without parental involvement, you mean.

And I thought you didn't know meals didn't include meat? You've just described somebody cooking vegetarian curries. Whether you liked them or not is neither here nor there, you did see people cooking vegetarian food.

Seeing somebody drive a car doesn't give you the knowledge about driving tests, the actual driving, the legal requirements, the test, the highway code, tax, insurance, MOTs or maintenance.

You found out about those and learned. Because YOU wanted to.

You could do the same for cooking for your family. You choose not to, because you don't want to.

If you can't drive for some reason, such as the car breaking down or you developing a medical condition that means you can't drive, how does that help a child sitting there saying 'I'm hungry'? or your DP being knackered - do you bleat at him that you're hungry and expect him to deal with it - or do you do something for somebody else and look up how to cook something he would like and do it for him?

do you bleat at him that you're hungry and expect him to deal with it - or do you do something for somebody else and look up how to cook something he would like and do it for him

I certainly don’t make anything for Dp as he is a meat eater.

I am perfectly happy to make stuff for other people I just prefer cold platters in turn Dd and Ds will put in a veggie burger or some veggie sausages and do some steamed vegetables etc

Dc will do veggie bolognaise and other stuff
If I want some.

I can’t see what this big deal is about not cooking.

You sound very stubborn Oliversmumsarmy. Your stubborn refusal to even try to learn to cook come across as digging your heels in as a point of principle.

Are you dyslexic or dyspraxic?

Dd cooks. She made cooked breakfast at 8 and at 10 can just about do a roast but needs help with timings.
Most of her friends seem not to have free reign in their own kitchens so come here to bake. I seem to have a permanent cluster of y6 girls baking cakes and biscuits in my kitchen. I mostly love it but it costs a fortune in ingredients!

When they get to high school I might move them on to cooking dinners too... 😂.

I seem to have a permanent cluster of y6 girls baking cakes and biscuits in my kitchen. I mostly love it but it costs a fortune in ingredients!

Do the parents not offer to contribute to the cost of ingredients if their child is baking at yours more than the odd occasion?

Thinking about it the only person I know that “doesn’t cook” is fil who sits around while mil waits on him hand on foot 🙄. It’s painful to watch frankly now they both retired.

I think that it would be useful for all children to have cookery lessons in school. Maybe just once a fortnight years 7-9 would be enormously beneficial to the health and well being of the nation as some of those children might be able to pass their skills and knowledge on to their parents who might not prepare and cook meals from scratch at home.

If the cost of ingredients is an issue would it be unrealistic to teach children how to cook without them cooking? Even if it meant watching cookery videos or watching the teacher making something? Just the thought of exposing childen to the idea that making a simple meal is easy, and doesn't just involve shoving some beige food into the oven?

DD was brought up being exposed to cookery shows from a very young age because I just love watching them myself. I know she would have been with me while Saturday Kitchen was on from at least the age of two.

Re all that stuff about designing packaging: why would you be doing it in Food Tech? We did Graphics at school - I stupidly did it for my GCSE even though I hated it and was rubbish at it - and designing packaging for an imaginary mobile phone was part of the assignment. Packaging design is far more relevant to Graphics than Food Tech. It's got nothing to do with cooking.

I did graphics too despite being shit at it because we had to do at D&T subject and I thought it would be the least effort . It doesn't even get mentioned on my CV so I resent how much time I was forced to spend on it.

The DT topics in general seemed focused around the designing of fucking pointless products rather than the learning of useful skills.

@SnuggyBuggy Both my brother and I did it and I don't think either of us got good marks and in hindsight we both should have done cooking/Food Tech. My school had that thing where you have to do long course or short course D&T depending on what subject you were doing out of certain columns. If you wanted to do short course IT or PE, you had to do long course D&T, and if you wanted to do art, music (which is what both of us did for GCSE) or drama, you had to do short course D&T. I was super fucked off about it because I wanted to do short course IT instead, but no. First I did Resistive Materials and then quit because the teacher was a useless sexist old fart who just ignored all the girls, and for whatever reason I did Graphics instead because I hated Textiles (I am utterly useless at any kind of textile work, even sewing, trying to thread a sewing machine was a nightmare) and because I hated cooking lessons in Year 7-9. At least if I'd done IT, it would have been useful but then it would have meant not doing music, and I loved music even though I hated the teacher. The whole mandatory D&T thing was a really stupid idea. It also meant that the music class had people in it who were doing IT or PE and could barely play an instrument, but did it because they can't act or draw and thought music would be a piece of piss.

Wait, my bad, we didn't have any people doing IT or PE. Just short course D&T. It was still a dumb idea though. As was making people choose between art and music.

My problem with D&T was I did well in my year 6 Sat's and for whatever reason that meant I was supposed to be good at D&T and I wasn't so I used to get it in the neck for not trying hard enough. I was trying, I was just crap.

I never understood why it was called resistant materials when we used the cheapest possible MDF that shattered at the slightest pressure .

Food tech just felt like being in Hells Kitchen being screamed at by Gordon Ramsay. I wasn't any good at textiles either because we were only shown how to use the sewing machine once, there was a whole crowd of us and I was at the back so couldn't see much.

Graphics was the best of a bad bunch.

YANBU - it is a life skill. You don't have to be amazing but being able to cook a few basic dishes from scratch will help avoid having to rely on takeaways/convenience foods.

Me and my brother and sister were all taught to cook at home. Just by helping in the kitchen. I could cook a basic family meal by the time I was 12 (with appropriate supervision of course).

My DS is only 6 but already, he helps me in the kitchen. Obviously at the moment there are things he isn't able to do but I support him to do what he can. We also bake -fairly simple recipes but ones which involve measuring ingredients etc.

My husband has a friend who is 51 and was never taught to cook since he divorced 2 years ago, he relies on takeaways and eating out. Literally hasn't a clue where to begin cooking a meal. He is an intelligent man who holds down a responsible job so in my view, there is no excuse now, he could use the internet/books and learn.

Ginfordinner

Probably ADHD and dyslexic if that has anything to do with the issue.

If someone isn’t that bothered about eating something why would they make it.

I much prefer a platter of different stuff that I can put together rather than for example ds’s mushroom casserole or dds chickpea curry.

Just because you don’t cook doesn’t mean you can’t put a meal on the table.

I seem to have managed to raise 2 dc on my own with little input from Dp as he worked away for 2 weeks in every 4 so it is possible to bring children up without cooking anything.

If you had said what the difficulties were at the beginning you wouldn't have had such a roasting on here. I apologise if I was rude to you.

I also like eating plates of deli style food, but I really enjoy a good curry as well

Oliversmumsarmy
Your kids sound like they learnt to cook out of necessity because all you would give them is jars from the fridge
But then you also say you don't mind it you just don't like cooking so that tells me you can cook if you need to for example for your kids when they were younger and your husband was away? so what are you on here arguing about?
You cooked for your kids when you had to and when you didn't have to because they were still being fed by their dad you chose not to
No one is saying u need to be a great cook or even enjoy cooking
But you need to make sure your children are fed healthy meals and it really doesn't hurt to help them learn about quick cheap meals also because you need to set them up for anything life throws at them
So basically you are on this thread debating with everyone even tho you do/did(until they were able to) cook for your children

Ginfordinner I did earlier on in the thread.

I can heat things up but anything more and it all goes wrong.

I never cook pasta which everyone else seems to think is simple.

Mine just ends up as a pan full of white gloop.

Tbh if someone can't put a timer on for 7 minutes and then stop the cooker, I am quite concern they are behind the wheel...

They are skills you pick up as you go, making a few mistakes on the way but hopefully ending up as quite a good cook - or at least acceptable. You have to have a little enthusiasm.

It's nice to involve kids in cooking, mine has always loved it.