DD has food tech practical on Thursday. She's 'learning' to make fairy cakes. Here is her list of ingredients to take in.

[MaureenMLove]

2 eggs
a shop bought fairy cake mix!

And the point is? Thankfully, my dd knows how to mix flour and eggs and sugar together to make cakes, but how and what on earth is that teaching to those who's parents don't have time to show their lo's.

Can't wait until she's learning to make hot pot or something at school. She'll learn the art of stabbing a plastic lid with a fork and setting the microwave timer for 5 minutes!

LMAO. how old are they btw?

its because they dont study cooking the y study food technology

so they compare factory products later

i found this silly

I'd refuse to send her in with this - this isn't cooking.

Will they be doing take-away menu planning next?

My DD's first SECONDARY school cooking lesson was......

Hotdogs!

Take in Frankfurters, bun, ketchup

By the way - not a pre-sliced bun. They have to cut it themselves

Bloody nora!

What year is your dd in?

this is terrible!!

Are the days of mixing flour and butter together then throwing at the classroom ceiling fan to see how far it would travel gone then? Or was that just my class

They had to cut it themselves - hope you complained milliways!

On a similar theme my mum bought some ready made jelly pots for my dd. I bought one or two then realised it literally takes a few seconds to "make" jelly.

We had the opposite in one year 7 class where the kids were given the ingredient list to make apple crumble & one lad came in with 2 apples and a shop bought packet mix

She's in Yr 7. I'm not that bothered about her doing it like that tbh. She cooks plenty of wonderful food with me and DH, so it'll be good for her to be able to compare decent food!

Its just such a shame, the school doesn't let them do it from scratch. How much longer would it take? And what about teaching the budget side of it. A bag of flour for a quid, would do at least 3 times as many cakes as a cake mix!

As I said, shame for the kids, who really need to know about cooking etc.

I think my first cookery lesson (called Home Economics then) was a cooked breakfast - scrambled eggs, bacon, tomatoes (which had to be cut into 'teeth'), toast and a cup of tea.

The toast was in a toast rack and the tea was made in a pot. Actually that may been my first lesson and the cooked breakfast a bit later.

I also remember having to make puff pastry which was a pita really.

LOL our first was a toasted cheese sandwich and chocolate milkshake.

I also remember one ingredient one week was a frozen block of pastry. Mum wasn't having it and I had to make it fresh then put it in the freezer. The teacher marked me down for that one too..

he he - start as you mean to go on.

Food technology should still include 'proper' cooking, it's part of my children's food technology curriculum. They make quite a variety of stuff, although they still have to look at a lot of commercial issues such as packaging, product design, marketing etc.

At the moment my daughter is doing the 'deconstruction' module - they literally have to dissassemble products and work out precisely what has gone into them.

ohhhhh this seriously pisses me off....

If my child has to be shown how to sling together a packet fairy cake mix by year seven, I will be bloody mortified with myself.

They seem to do proper food at dd's school - so far she's made white sauce, rolled out pasta dough, made pasta sauce and created her own baked pasta dish. Made spinach and ricotta stuffed shells with tomato and mascarpone sauce. That was in 8 weeks. In Y9 dd has made some gorgeous cinnamon and walnut danish pastry type buns. They still do the nutrition bit and make high/med/low fat versions of food and taste test it. Can't really see why other schools can't do the same.

Last night DD (10) made a lovely tea for herself & her dad

She wrapped leeks in sliced ham then cooked them in the oven in a cheese sauce

I was very impressed - she chose the recipe, collected the ingredients, made it and left the washing up for someone else - I reckon she will go far

My dd has done Food Technology GCSE - last exam on Thursday - and the main aim of the course was how to manufacture products in bulk. She did do some cooking as she had to make 5 different products on a particular theme - one of the five a day fruit and vegetables for a toddler. Having made the five separate dishes she had to choose one to improve.

The main problem I had was that she would make the receipe at home to practice it and then make it in school. We had variations on stuffed pancakes for weeks so if I ever see another one it will be too soon.

Dd was very disappointed with the course as it didn't really teach her to cook but she still did the best she could.

My dd did fodd tec in year 7 and then again later in year 9. When she was in year 9 the teacher got all the pupils to make their own recipy and then cook the food.

my dd made blue cheese and walnut sauce with pasta. it was lovely and great to cook your own food from scratch and your own recipe.

I do remember vagley my dd making something similar to fairy cakes with mixes and stuff in year 7 with the same teacher so perhpas the idea is to start simple and work upwards and notice the difference?

How long will cooking from scratch take:-

example

Shortbread

caster sugar
flour
butter

method

place in bowl, rub together, place in oven for ten to 15 minutes at 160 - 180

time taken

teacher 30 - 40 minutes

pupils (24 in class) between 40 - 90 minutes
not including cleaning up

length of lesson 60 minutes.

My little brother did Food Tech for GCSE and was bitterly disappointed at the lack of cooking. My mum ended up showing him the basics at home before he went to uni, he loves to cook.

I think for my first Home Ec lesson at secondary school we did 'a hot drink', not tea or anything like that, had to buy a crappy instant choc sachet thing

Imo the idea of cookery lessons is that it's not just about how to cook!

It's about being able to follow instructions, timing, learning from your mistakes etc

That's interesting re your dd's exam Larry55.

DS is Yr 7 and has made fresh coleslaw, fruit salad, smoothies, tomato/vegetable soup and couscous.They spent a lot of time practicing their chopping skills

Has she designed a pizza on the computer yet?

No - they never actually made a real pizza.

What fun we had trying to draw the wretched thing and download it onto a floppy disc to be printed at school (very old computer and non functioning printer). NOT.