AIBU a generation that can’t be bothered.

A programme some years ago concluded it took little more time to construct many simple dishes than to buy them ready made. Instant porage involved milk, the contents of a sachet, and a microwave and cost 25p. Home made required identical effort and cost 4p. There were many more examples. I read today of a woman whose cooker has broken so she has borrowed a two ring hotplate and a microwave, and says she can cook only pasta, chips and chicken nuggets. I don't understand why she can't cook any vegtables on the two ring hotplate, or boil a piece of gammon, or fry chicken, or simmer a stew......perhaps I am being judgemental, unkind, lacking understanding etc. but it seems that many people don't cook or even know how to in spite of relentless TV cookery programmes - we are 're heaters' rather than cooks.

-It's all been said before but practical skills such as cooking should be taught in schools instead of Food Technology.-

My daughter made Bolognese sauce in food tech at school. I provided Mince and mushrooms with the sauce base being provided by the school. When I asked what was in the sauce base they were given she didn't know! Sadly that is teaching them to 'buy a jar'!
Next time I made Bolognese sauce she was in the kitchen watching me prepare it. The only convenience I used was tinned chopped tomatoes!
I do buy some convenience food, often when things are in the reduced section and I'm feeling lazy, but I more often cook from scratch. It's cheaper, and healthier too!
My DM was a cookery teacher and was horrified to find that I bought ready prepared crumble mix as I struggled with 'rubbing in'. She set to and made me a huge plastic tub full herself which lasted months! Both my kids cook from scratch most of the time, especially my son who is far more adventurous in the kitchen than I ever was. He's taught me a thing or two, and my grandson benefits with a variety of fresh vegetables to try.

Judge not others …. YABU as you have no idea of anyone else’s circumstances…

Just as an aside, all my kids and their partners can cook a variety of good healthy meals and my daughter and her partner are both primary school teachers and yes both their schools do “proper” school lunches cooked by professional cooks

Well what can I say. Due to allergies it is safer for me to cook all meals from scratch. I cook hubby carnivore and me vegan, yes even hubbies is made from fresh products. But and a big but I have the time now I'm retired to source fresh products and cook every thing including bread. I see my children, they do try the same but with work, children, children's outside activities and so much more I can understand buying things that they can just pull out of fridge, like grated cheese, and cook. They don't buy ready meals.

It’s such a shame proper cooking isn’t taught in schools any more. I was lucky going to a girls grammar where we all learnt to cook. My children have been bossing it in the kitchen since they were two years old and are both great scratch cooks.

Frozen onions and bagged salads and microwave rice avoid waste and save on fuel, although they seem wasteful. You don'y buy different greens that will go to waste, the rice is pre-cooked so you can add it to the salad, and the onions will do for baked food, pasta sauces, pies and broth. The reporter either does not shop for that amount, or does not do the cooking in her household.

Yup think you’re being a bit unreasonable ! I worked full time (still am) and brought up 4 children, husband worked very long hours and had a long commute, I did not have long maternity leave either approx 12 weeks and with one child just 6 weeks. Lots of people actually don’t have great cooking facilities either

This had me laughing out loud Coastpath. So true how some things can be misrepresented.
I think things are changing though with more people cooking from scratch and growing their own. Enjoying cooking and far more experimental with new recipes than I was bought up on.

A very sweeping statement to say a whole generation shop this way . Some may but a lot don't. Its very hard as life has changed with majority of women working. I don't think it's anyone's place to be judgemental. Neither is it fair to label a whole generation.

I went to a Girls Grammar School in Birmingham, 1948 I think it may have been or `47

an academic school, yet my first year was Cookery class, and my mother had already taught me cooking

now I admit I have not read all the posts here.
but I often wonder about the "poverty" the people who claim poverty, I would like to see the budget, what the money is actually spent on.

but then, life has changed so very much now hasn`t it,, we mustn`t forget that! technology, ie. mobile phones etc. necessities, and so expensive....

I think proper school dinners are a thing of the past.

I think it’s a sign of the times, but it also could show that this age group haven’t much a clue how to cook. Shouldn’t we be
Campaigning for Home Economics, especially cookery to be brought back into schools, alongside knowledge of food etc?

MissAdventure

I never feel guilty.
I try to force my grandson to have a dinner at school so I don't have to bother.
Unfortunately, lunchtime is so short, and the food queue so long, he's lucky to get a bacon roll to wolf down.

That's awful MissA. Do you mean he sometimes has just a bacon roll at lunch time to last him until his evening meal? Which I hope is a proper cooked meal?

Nanna8 ??

I find if you go down the bottom of the garden and dig you get these lovely protein based long pinkish brown things which go well on a barbeque with a nice grass and nettle salad. And it's all free!

I feel so lucky to have had realschool dinners in the 60s/70s….yes even the rubber stew and boiled dock leaf —cabbage— with a proper dinner hour that felt much longer somehow?

No. DIL said she might as well have done a packed lunch. They have dinners 2 or 3 times a week but the choice is very poor on late sitting.

Yes, exactly the same here.
It's not really acceptable, is it?

blue25

Don’t be so judgemental. You know nothing about her circumstances. We need more compassion & empathy, not judgement over such petty things.

It was a journalist doing supposed research.

It wasn't very scientific, was it ?

MissAdventure

I never feel guilty.
I try to force my grandson to have a dinner at school so I don't have to bother.
Unfortunately, lunchtime is so short, and the food queue so long, he's lucky to get a bacon roll to wolf down.

I've been there when DIL has asked DGD what she had for so-called school dinner and it was a roll or some such because there was nothing else left. They have only a short break and they are in shifts so if they're on late dinners there are only a few choices left.

Don’t be so judgemental. You know nothing about her circumstances. We need more compassion & empathy, not judgement over such petty things.

annodomini

Dickens
^Schools used to teach kids to actually cook - I remember rushing down to the playground to hand over ingredients to my son who'd forgotten to mention it the night before...
Now they study Food Technology. Parents, pupils and teachers have expressed concern over the value of this part of the Curriculum,^
There is an alternative which my grandson took instead of GCSE Food Technology. He did BTech Catering and Hospitality and got a distinction which he has used to good effect by working as a chef on weekends and during holidays from Sixth Form. I've tasted his cooking and can vouch for its professional quality.

Trying to remember from the dim and distant past, I think Food Tech came in with the National Curriculum in 1989. Most younger secondary school (KS3) pupils each year do a rotation of subjects (half a term Textiles, half a term Woodwork, Food etc) within DT, and then they choose one subject for GCSE.
Regarding BTECs, I know Gavin Williamson was trying to get rid of them last summer, but prior to that I think they were not in the schools' interest because they didn't count towards the schools' published assessment (I may have remembered that incorrectly, or it may have all changed now!? Anyone with more recent knowledge, please correct what I've said.)

Hithere

Don't fathers also feed their kids?

no dear, they have much more important jobs to get on with <urgh>

Don't fathers also feed their kids?