Learning to Cook?

Scooter said:

My daughter (age 11) has chosen cooking as her summer focus. She knows
her way around the kitchen to some extent already, but mostly in terms
of helping/watching me. (That plus the endless food safety units in
middle school.)

She's interested right now but I know she's going to need some help
down the road to get past the "what do I do next?" hurdle. Therefore,
I'm trying to figure out the best way to help her structure her efforts
so she learns something but doesn't get turned off in the process, and
I'm having trouble. For example, she could dive deeply into a small
number of specifics (the Summer of Bread, Cookies Ad Nauseam) or try a
little of a lot of things, and I don't know which is better. She has
access to cookbooks and the web, but not much in the way of local
classes. We do have a lot of interesting little restaurants in the
area; however, they're mostly Mexican and that's not her favorite
genre.

So... If you were a kid and had three months of free time to mess
around in the kitchen, what would you do?

I have to tell you, I am not too sure about cooking as a "summer focus" .
Sure, it's great to learn how to cook, but if she does more than cook meals
and baking once or twice a week, she is going to be fat as a house. I would
rather see a child in some sort of physical activity for the summer. Giver
her a chance to develop some strength and some athletic skills and get a
good start on a healthy lifestyle that she can try to maintain for the rest
of her long life, as opposed to sitting around cooking and eating all
summer and develop a weight problem that is likely to get worse as she gets
older.

Scooter said:

My daughter (age 11) has chosen cooking as her summer focus. She knows
her way around the kitchen to some extent already, but mostly in terms
of helping/watching me. (That plus the endless food safety units in
middle school.)

She's interested right now but I know she's going to need some help
down the road to get past the "what do I do next?" hurdle. Therefore,
I'm trying to figure out the best way to help her structure her efforts
so she learns something but doesn't get turned off in the process, and
I'm having trouble. For example, she could dive deeply into a small
number of specifics (the Summer of Bread, Cookies Ad Nauseam) or try a
little of a lot of things, and I don't know which is better. She has
access to cookbooks and the web, but not much in the way of local
classes. We do have a lot of interesting little restaurants in the
area; however, they're mostly Mexican and that's not her favorite
genre.

So... If you were a kid and had three months of free time to mess
around in the kitchen, what would you do?

When I was a kid, the family requirement was that each child had to
contribute 3 items to family eating that week. It could be making the
salad at dinnertime, scrambling eggs for breakfast, packing lunch
sandwiches, or preparing dessert. Let her try a variety of things and
she'll find out what she enjoys in the kitchen and what she doesn't.
This was also good because we could choose when we felt like helping
and when we didn't.

One week i might get into doing breakfast and make french toast,
quiche, and crepes, the next week I might do dinner and make meatloaf,
mashed potatoes and salad, depended on mymood. I happened to like
desserts a lot =)

Also give her the chance to explore different types of cuisine, try
something German this week, Chinese next week, BBQ the week after.

As far as classes, don't know where you are, but a promo for my
franchise business - our franchise is in Virginia, but I know the
business is growing nationally - Young Chef's Academy is a cooking
school geared towards kids. Check us out online to see if there's one
near you. Also check your local Y's and rec centers and JCCs, places
like that.

Quoted message said:

Thanks,

Scooter

"Scooter" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

My daughter (age 11) has chosen cooking as her summer focus. She knows
her way around the kitchen to some extent already, but mostly in terms
of helping/watching me. (That plus the endless food safety units in
middle school.)

She's interested right now but I know she's going to need some help
down the road to get past the "what do I do next?" hurdle. Therefore,
I'm trying to figure out the best way to help her structure her efforts
so she learns something but doesn't get turned off in the process, and
I'm having trouble. For example, she could dive deeply into a small
number of specifics (the Summer of Bread, Cookies Ad Nauseam) or try a
little of a lot of things, and I don't know which is better. She has
access to cookbooks and the web, but not much in the way of local
classes. We do have a lot of interesting little restaurants in the
area; however, they're mostly Mexican and that's not her favorite
genre.

So... If you were a kid and had three months of free time to mess
around in the kitchen, what would you do?

Thanks,

Scooter

The first thing I'd do is buy her a book she'll appreciate forever, "Joy of
Cooking". Not the paperback, but the hard cover version. Lots of easy
recipes. Lots of basic info about ingredients, like "About flour". Choose
easy recipes from the book together until she realizes how effective it is
to have a resource like that. If she has questions about what it means to
baste a chicken, make it clear that it's just as quick to find the answer in
that book as it is to poke around the web. Not only will she learn to cook,
but she'll learn to study, a skill that's rarely taught in schools any more.

I hear ya, Dave! But we have the physical part covered--she's on a
softball team (her other passion) that practices and/or plays games for
a couple of hours a day almost every day. Between that and geocaching
with her dad, hiking, swimming, etc., she's pretty darned active. If
she can also learn to cook and eat healthy, she'll have it made.

aem said:

Dave Smith said:

I have to tell you, I am not too sure about cooking as a "summer focus" .
Sure, it's great to learn how to cook, but if she does more than cook meals
and baking once or twice a week, she is going to be fat as a house.

That's ridiculous. Cooking has nothing whatsoever to do with
overeating.

If it is the "summer focus" there is bound ot be a lot of food.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

I would
rather see a child in some sort of physical activity for the summer.

She's eleven years old. Of course she's going to be physically active.
Did you think she was going to be in the kitchen all day every day?

Not is she is in the kitchen all the time. The kid next door was 10 when we moved
in. He was chubby then. He was never active. The only cycling he ever did was on
a dirt bike. He started off chubby and now he is huge.

Quoted message said:

Learning to cook can be a key component of a healthy lifestyle,
especially in the U.S. where kids need all the ammunition against fast
food joints that they can get.

I am all for teaching kids healthy eating .

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

... as opposed to sitting around cooking and eating all
summer and develop a weight problem that is likely to get worse as she gets
older.

Again, that's your false assumption. -aem

Maybe, but I don't know many kids who had a strong interest in cooking as kids
that didn't develop weight problems.

Dave Smith said:

I have to tell you, I am not too sure about cooking as a "summer focus" .
Sure, it's great to learn how to cook, but if she does more than cook meals
and baking once or twice a week, she is going to be fat as a house. I would
rather see a child in some sort of physical activity for the summer.

I'd rather have my kid learn healthy cooking and nutrition at home as
part of an active summer rather than live the life of drive-through
windows at McCrap-on-a-bun on their hurried way between soccer practice
and tennis camp.

I still own my first cookbook, which I got from my Mom when I was about
10, the Betty Crocker Boys and Girls Cookbook. I loved having my own
cookbook, and I used it. There are probably some good ones out there
for her to start on now.

Sandy

Scooter said:

I hear ya, Dave! But we have the physical part covered--she's on a
softball team (her other passion) that practices and/or plays games for
a couple of hours a day almost every day. Between that and geocaching
with her dad, hiking, swimming, etc., she's pretty darned active. If
she can also learn to cook and eat healthy, she'll have it made.

Phew. That is a relief. When I first read it I pictured her in the kitchen
all day.

"Dave Smith" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Maybe, but I don't know many kids who had a strong interest in cooking as
kids
that didn't develop weight problems.

I love statistics. What is the size of your sample, Dave? How many kids are
we talking about?

i really enjoyed cooking at that age. i think that kids who acquire
some level of skill early will always feel competent to improvise or
work from a recipe. Mark Bittman's books introduce basic skills and
require very little in the way of specialized equipment. (he works in
an average-i.e. tiny- nyc kitchen.) there is even a simplified version
of his book "how to cook everything".

JoeSpareBedroom said:

"Dave Smith" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Maybe, but I don't know many kids who had a strong interest in cooking as
kids
that didn't develop weight problems.

I love statistics. What is the size of your sample, Dave? How many kids are
we talking about?

"Scooter" <[email hidden]> wrote in news:1148497331.239342.318870
@j55g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:

Quoted message said:

My daughter (age 11) has chosen cooking as her summer focus. She knows
her way around the kitchen to some extent already, but mostly in terms
of helping/watching me. (That plus the endless food safety units in
middle school.)

She's interested right now but I know she's going to need some help
down the road to get past the "what do I do next?" hurdle. Therefore,
I'm trying to figure out the best way to help her structure her efforts
so she learns something but doesn't get turned off in the process, and
I'm having trouble. For example, she could dive deeply into a small
number of specifics (the Summer of Bread, Cookies Ad Nauseam) or try a
little of a lot of things, and I don't know which is better. She has
access to cookbooks and the web, but not much in the way of local
classes. We do have a lot of interesting little restaurants in the
area; however, they're mostly Mexican and that's not her favorite
genre.

So... If you were a kid and had three months of free time to mess
around in the kitchen, what would you do?

Here's a start
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/foodwine/2002983401
_webgirlwinners10.html

--

Charles
The significant problems we face cannot be solved
at the same level of thinking we were at when we
created them. Albert Einstein