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

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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.

And are we defining "cooking" "boiling a pan of water" "chopping and cutting" "heating the oven"...everyone has a different idea of what cooking is.

I agree, and I don't buy it when people say "I can't cook". If you can read, you can cook.

You don't even have to be able to read, you can watch YouTube videos by voice search.
Cooking is easy, I don't even think it deserves to be dressed up as some mysterious skill that people have to master. Not cooking is a choice that people make because they don't want to cook. We don't have lessons in school on how to assemble flat pack furniture, you just follow the instructions. Why do we pretend basic cooking is any different.

I had old-fashioned cookery lessons which taught me four ways to make biscuits and how to make scones. Nothing on budgeting etc.
Fortunately my mum could and did teach me what I needed to know, mostly by being disabled and if I hadn't followed her instructions there's have been no dinner.

We did have a fantastic reference book kept in the loo, called Bachelor's Buttons - covered house cleaning, how not to be ripped off by credit cards, food shopping, what does and doesnt need to go in the fridge, basic cooking, and how to make the whole house look presentable in an hour when you've woken up with a hangover and mum says she's going to drop by. Said book goes for about 50 quid now on Ebay, sadly.

I've known multiple guys who taught themselves to cook by following the instructions on packets (starting with pasta, working up to roast dinners) - if someone wants to learn, they can. What's harder is learning that potatoes and dry pasta are cheap and filling, as are carrots and cabbage, and there's a reason many cuisines are basically those with a bit of flavouring.

Getting the confidence to try doing new things - that's something both families and schools need to try to instil in kids.

I'm not sure how to do that (though my 8yo likes cooking so can do OK, and the 12 yo can do toast and knows the theory of much more cookery).

Easy enough to teach your kids if you cant cook.....ask your school to set up after school cookery classes.. www.smartraspberry.com

No one taught me how to cook. Mum always made homemade food, but I was just never interesting in learning to cook. The outdoors was just much more interesting.

I, however, am an.adult and so I got a cookbook for a quid in a charity shop, watched tv when cooking shows were on and later found recipes online. I because a pretty good cook quite quickly (bit of a self praise there, I know).

There is no "can't cook" (unless of course you have certain disabilities), there is only "I can't be arsed to learn by myself so I need someone to tell me what to do"

Agree totally and it’s so sad that there’s a now 2 generations who can’t cook or have no interest in it.

I’m lucky - I had a mum who was a professional cook and we had weeks of home economics in school (in the 1990’s) where I learnt the basics (although I already knew them as I’d been cooking as a small child with my mum).

I have a 15 DSD who’s diet consists of vanilla frozen food reheated (which isn’t cooking). Her own mum doesn’t cook, she has absolutely no interest, my DSD also has absolutely no interest either. She did a couple of weeks of Food Technology in school and made a couple of desserts. That would as it. Learnt no skills whatsoever and at 15 can’t even cook an egg. Have tried teaching her but she just wants to eat convenience crap.

So sad, that’s another generation not able to cook or pass the skills on.

A healthy diet and the ability to cook is a life lesson everyone needs. No wonder 29% of U.K. adults are clinically obese and a FURTHER 36% are overweight. That’s 65% of the population who have a weight problem.

And telling them to google it isn’t going to work. It needs to be brought back into the school curriculum.

I completely agree. Budgeting, shopping and cooking healthy and nutritious meals should be part of the curriculum both in primary and in secondary schools. Sewing used to be an essential skill 100 years ago and was therefore taught in schools (albeit to girls only).

Getting the confidence to try doing new things - that's something both families and schools need to try to instil in kids

I agree. Thinking about it here though I think there is value in having a safe space like a basic cookery class to help you master the fundamentals. After that, all the resources out there might be more effective.

I wasn't allowed to cook at home, and my secondary school cookery classes were just making tray bakes and flapjacks. I went to university utterly unprepared to feed myself and was quite resentful of my parents for it. My diet was terrible even for a student and i was regularly laughed at for not knowing the basics of cooking various dishes. I'm now quite a good cook if I say so myself, but that's also because I have the time and means to buy nice and healthy ingredients, spend time cooking etc. When I did my PhD I worked 80 hours a week and earned 13k, meals were cans of soup or a piece of chicken in the oven with microwave veg bags.

I don't know how i learnt to cook - I think mainly at home, although i have memories of disasterous domestic science lessons 😅

I'm glad that I do know how to cook, and would teach any of my children how to as a matter of course.

I think basic cooking should be taught in school. Ideally it would happen at home but for many it just doesn’t and knowing the basics gives you confidence to practice and branch out from there.
I was lucky that my mum always cooked and I also had good food tech teaching at school but now so many schools don’t have any cooking facilities and education isn’t focussed on life skills more on training to pass exams.

My dc have always cooked with me. I am lucky to have the time and skill to have them cook. I think a lot of cooking with dc focuses on baking cakes or biscuits but I have mine helping to make main meals too.

I cook a lot of different types of food ( I enjoy the eating rather than the cooking! )

I can see why people don't though, as you can buy everything ready to heat up. Ready made mash potato, vegetables prepared and ready to steam in the microwave, raw chicken already marinaded and ready to put in the oven etc

You can get so many different things that you don't have to prepare food or think about the flavours that go in it.

I think that you can still have a balanced diet without really cooking.

I think that you can still have a balanced diet without really cooking.

You can, but it’s a lot more expensive to eat that way.

I used to teach cooking at the sure start centre until it closed. It never ceased to amaze me how little they knew on day 1 (6 part course). Simple things like how to hold a knife to chop. We taught how to make a basic tomato sauce with veg in the first week that can be used in pasta, chilli etc. Some had never even used dolmio - I showed them the price difference and there was always a gasp, because the 4 ready meals they would buy cost £8 approx

I did food technology at school but feel that traditional home economics would have been more useful

Whilst I agree with the basic proposition in the OP, I don't agree that logically it follows that 'and if we only taught everyone basic cooking skills, the obesity crisis would be solved'. Reasons for people having poor diets are complex and multi-factorial, often closely linked to poverty and associated issues like poor housing, poor employment opportunities and poor mental health. Simply sending everyone to a cooking class isn't going to magic away all those problems, and like others have said, in todays information era it's actually not that hard to learn to cook and about healthy eating so it's a bit paternalistic/patronising to assume that if we simply round up all those ignorant poor people stuffing their faces with MaccieDs and teach them about the joys of quinoa and strawberries everything will be fixed!

I really like this blog on the topic. Like several on this thread, the author with well meaning intent set up cookery classes at a poor school, and wondered why he wasn't making a difference to the pupils' diets - he gives an accessible/humorous account of his thought processes/discoveries from there....

I couldn't boil an egg or fry one before I met dh. He is a good cook and I love to eat so I finally took up the initiative and learnt. There have been some howlers on the way but I think I am pretty good now. Growing up the kitchen was my mum's domanlin too, I did want to help and would frequently ask her but she didn't have the so called time to answer questions and I got underfoot. As a result I learned to just stay put of the kitchen.

Now i cook from scratch most days and my kids are almost always in the kitchen whilst I cook. We bake together and I will let them watch me make chappattis, homemade bread etc. I want my kids to have at least basic cooking skills.

@Loveinatimeofcovid

All this information is readily available on the internet and is so straight forward that it doesn’t require any special guidance. I don’t see how it could be any easier for people to learn how to cook.

I totally disagree with this.

Yes, people can read books and follow recipes and watch videos, but if you're broke, you probably don't want to spend money on raw ingredients when you might get it all wrong. It's easier and less intimidating to just grab something to put in the oven.

Lots of people don't have the confidence to teach themselves things. It should come from the parents.

Simple things like how to hold a knife to chop.

Exactly. And if this is your baseline, YouTube tutorials probably won’t do much for you.

Completely agree with you op.
I learnt to cook just by being around when my mum was cooking. Without actually being aware of it, I knew what went into a dish, how to put it together and what it should look like.
We also had domestic science lessons at school which involved some cooking and a lot of information about nutrition.
I can't honestly remember the last time I bought a ready meal.

My partner could not really cook when I met him. He could make stuff from a jar, or a packet etc. But no more than that. His mother was a single parent who's solution was to buy ready meals or frozen chips and nuggets that he could reheat for him and his brother when they got home. My mother was also a single mother who would batch cook with me a couple of times a week so that I could reheat stuff when I got home. Different routes to the same outcome.

He learnt to cook by cooking with me, and now is a reasonable cook who can follow a recipe and make things up as he goes along which usually turn out OK

I am another who was at school in the early 1970s when we were taught not just how to cook but how to meal plan and budget. We has a mini "apartment" in the cookery dept where everyone got chance to spend a day. We had to plan shop and cook a meal and invite teachers to eat.

I didn't teach my DC much until they were 17 and heading for uni. Before that they could rustle up basic stuff for lunch but weren't interested. At school they did the design a sandwich stuff.

All this information is readily available on the internet and is so straight forward that it doesn’t require any special guidance. I don’t see how it could be any easier for people to learn how to cook.

I disagree.
It's actually much more difficult than some people make out and not as easy as just reading a recipe. Cookery books all assume some skill or knowledge.
In teaching my DC I made lots of assumptions that were wrong.
I assumed they could choose the right knife and chop an onion.
I assumed they knew what was meant by browning onions.
I had to wind back and start from absolute basics.

What sort of onion to use? Which chilli?
How to make the most of in season veg.
How to peel and chop every different kind of veg.
How long do things take to cook?
What is important from a food hygiene / poisoning point of view.
Lack of basic skills and knowledge means you can probably follow a recipe but would struggle to improvise.
Just as important is how to shop for food.

Considering most health problems are caused by an unhealthy diet and poor lifestyle choices I think it’s neglect if you don’t teach your children how to eat a healthy diet.
Call me judgemental but it’s true.

I didn't realise cookery wasn't still taught at school to be honest. DS has had cookery lessons at his secondary school for the past two years.

Granted it is only 6 weeks in each school year (huge school - at least 11 classes in each year group). So they do 6 weeks of food theory where they cover everything from the difference between 'best before and use by' dates, to working out a shopping list, to the 'designing a new flavour of crisps' type thing mentioned earlier.

Then they do 6 weeks of cookery - he's made chicken or vegetarian fajitas, curry, a mild arrabiata sauce for pasta (plus the pasta), lemon drizzle cake, scones, cottage pie to name but a few. We pay £9 for the 6 weeks; the school buys the ingredients in bulk and distributes enough for one portion per child in the lesson. So the drizzle cake was a small loaf tin size (like an individual cake). But the principle of cooking is there and no-one misses out as the school will take the £9 over the 6 weeks for those who can't afford it in one hit.

He's cooked the fajitas, curry and pasta sauce quite a few times at home. The school will give them the recipe to serve 4 at the end of each lesson.

DH and I also get him involved in basic cooking at home. So, if I'm doing a bolognese, I'll explain he can do the same basic start of the dish to make a chilli, cottage pie, mince casserole and how he can buy stuff like mince in bulk to eek out student cash for example. Same for things like chicken or cheap veg in the market - making a vegetable based chilli or pasta sauce. He needs to know how to live on a budget when he leaves home.

Also people should be educated on free radicals and antioxidants and how oxidative stress causes DNA mutations which lead to cancer.