Can your children cook?

[AlwaysCountYourPennies]

I think basic cooking ability is an important life skill. I grew up in a home where my grandmother and mother cooked and passed on their knowledge.
From a young age I remember helping to peel veg, measure ingredients, mash and stir.... as I got older I was able to make a lot of basic meals myself and enjoyed trying new recipes.
When I left home (1985) I soon realised than many of my peers hadn't been taught the skills I had and some of them really struggled with cooking for themselves and spent much more than me on eating out or buying ready meals.
My 17 year old has grown up helping me cook and can confidentiality cook a basic meal.... I taught her as my mother taught me by getting her involved in the kitchen. My brother is a chef so cooking is a family thing!
My 15 year old has sever learning difficulties and autism but he likes to help stir and measure too, he used to eat a very restricted diet but by getting him to help cook things he has been more willing to try new foods.
If you cook who taught you and who is teaching your children?

YABU..... its not an important life skill
YANBU... It is an important life skill

Of course it is

It's as essential as knowing how to brush your teeth or tie your shoelaces

It is an important life skill. Mine are 4 and 8 - they do help in the kitchen sometimes but don't have much interest really. I hope that changes as they got older. I'm not planning to have them leave home without knowing the basics. It's especially important for DD1 as she is a coeliac and a vegetarian so cannot live off ready meals / frozen food.

Heard a good idea once that every kid should learn to cook 10 meals from scratch before leaving school. That sounds good enough given some dishes can be modified it would cover the fundamentals.

They are only 9&11, so learning rather than competent. But basic skills like measuring, peeling, knife safety, oven safety etc are all in place, plus following a recipe.

But... I regularly cook (5/6 times a week, with one or two 'easy' meals like pizza or oven fish/chips). Plus during lockdown it was something to do...

In a household where no one is home until 6pm or without equipment it would be a lot harder.

My boys can certainly eat for England.

Humans have to eat so learning to cook is an important skill in the same way that humans need to wear clean clothes so need to learn how to do laundry.

No one ever really taught me to cook anything other than a roast. The rest I’ve figured out for myself. At the moment with a 5, 2 and 1 year old and a DH with late shifts I don’t get chance to cook from scratch every day but as they get older I will do more and get them involved. At the moment they help out with basic stuff like scrambled egg or pizza toppings and they help with baking. They do like chopping their own fruit up (strawberries and bananas).

Just waiting for a poster to say my dc have been whipping up Michelin star quality meals since birth.

Of course it's a life skill.

My kids have 'helped' in the kitchen since they were small now and have been cooking at the weekends because they want to since they were about 8. Simple things like fajitas, pasta, bolognaise, curry.

They also both love baking and are much better at it than I am.

My parents were basic cooks - Dad had a more adventurous palate but I pretty much taught myself. We are a bit food obsessed in this house - so I taught my kids to be adventurous with food - all our holidays revolved around good food destinations, they did food tech but they really started to practice properly at Uni when they had to cook every day and when they come home during the holidays cooking is a shared chore.

My kids can cook to a level in line with their ages. My parents are both good cooks and I learnt watching them. My kids learnt watching and helping me. I have noted with my in-laws that neither parent was a good cook and as a result my husband and his many siblings (bar one) cannot cook.

10 year old could quite easily cook the family dinner if the recipe was appropriate - she can make chilli, spag bol etc with just adult supervision from a distance. The kitchen would look like a bomb site when she'd done it though.

9 year old - she's quite good with chopping, stirring etc - but her sequencing and organisation skills are difficult as the result of developmental conditions sh has - so she'd need a bit more support or a simplified recipe and prompting to track each step logically.

10 year old likes doing it more than the 9 year old as well (who is much more into the disposal of the food down her throat) so she tends to do it more.

My 9yr old will help with certain fun things like cake or gingerbread etc, but he has autism and ADHD and generally loses interest fairly quickly, I'm not ready to trust him with things like peeling or chopping just yet as he is very accident prone and not so great at listening.

My 11yr old loves cooking, she is very slow at it but can peel and chop veg, mash potatoes etc. She loves baking and learning to measure things out, break eggs and mix things together. I don't let her near the gas hobs on the oven though as she is careless and also short!

I taught both mine (boys) to cook. One really enjoys it, loves food and cooks a lot. Other can put a basic meal together but not really bothered what's put in front of him and would live on pizza if he could. Both can bake a cake.

Yes, my 17 year old is a fantastic cook. She regularly cooks from scratch, her specialities are homemade pesto, lasagne, chicken enchiladas and tagliatelle carbonara. She hates anything from a jar or a meal kit and prefers to do it all herself - I am much lazier with cooking and happy to cut corners!

One is an excellent cook, one can cook 5 or 6 meals competently, one would rather starve than make anything other than cereal, sandwiches and ready meals.

I agree with you OP and my DC are pretty good. But I have to say that my mum didn't teach me to cook and I'm now a good cook (I think!). It's easy to pick up as an adult.

Nobody taught me anything, I was completely neglected and ignored by my parents and left home ignorant so I taught my DS everything.
I taught him to cook from 13 and he cooked 2-3 times a week and how to use the washing machine, iron and so on.
He's 40 now and says most of his friends can't do any of those things and have no interest in learning because they have partners who do it all.
Very depressing.

My 17 year old daughter is a very good cook. She’s aware of healthy eating and is kind of a ‘my body is my temple’ kid. Her 15 year old sister is competent enough, but would probably prefer to make a cake, but yes, she can cook. My son
(also 15) makes a good bacon and egg sandwich or cheese toastie. I don’t know how he would go following a recipe. He’s never done it. He doesn’t like cooking.

I hated it as a kid and didn’t learn. When I left home, mum bought me a basic cookbook. That’s where I learned to roast a chicken, and make a basic soup. My kids would say I’m a really good cook. Cooking more complicated dishes takes practice, of course.

I think every adult who can read, can cook. If they say they can’t, it’s just that they just choose not to. Following simple recipes is not difficult for a functional adult or teenager.

Of course it’s a life skill, my eldest is nearly 7 and can cook for himself most basic meals, he doesn’t but can if needed.

DD is 5 and can prepare a basic lunch and breakfast for herself, and help with dinner.

both can bake basics too

Yes, and my eldest is doing cooking for Bronze Duke of Edinburgh, and has just chosen Food tech GCSE for next year. I detest that we have to measure out and transport every single ingredient to school (not the case at my old school) but it’s worth it.

I'm only a basic cook but taught mine to cook from scratch, they are more adventurous than me. The main difference is I can bake, and they haven't bothered to learn.

My 3 year old is an expert at garlic crushing and chopping things with a pizza cutter but as they chop and crush indiscriminately, they aren't much help. They are also good at whisking, stirring and piling decorations into the very centre of a cake/biscuit. They have achieved expert level in spoon licking.

The 10 year old isn't too bad but needs to be watched. They are a very solid sous chef but don't have the confidence to completely cook a meal from scratch solo yet.

The 14 year old is pretty competent and can cook a decent range of standard meals. They also like to bake. They are not good at cleaning up after themselves and refuse to believe that icing sugar needs to be sifted so eating their baking can be challenging.

Overall, I'm fairly confident they'll be able to feed themselves when the time comes.

My mum, or dad, didn't teach me to cook, so I made it a priority when I had my boys. They can both cook now, they are 16 and 18.

Im teaching my 4 year old (I love cooking it’s a hobby for me) and she really likes helping to pour, stir, break eggs etc. I started off teaching her all the names of ingredients when she was first learning to talk and now she knows lots of different things and what what ingredients go in what. It’s so cute. I’m making her a little recipe book of stuff I regularly cook for when she is older. I’m going to teach my 2 year old too.