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| Three generations of home cooks (we hope!) |
By Michelle Tippens
According to a study by Porch.com in “Cooking Nightmares: A Generational Look at Capabilities in the Kitchen,” millennials make an average of 13 meals at home a week. Apparently, this is a shamefully slim number of meals cooked at home. To me, this is an extremely impressive number. As a junior in college, my extent of cooking knowledge goes as far as stir fry, which is still a feat to me. I may average 2 homemade meals a week if I’m feeling ambitious.
Cooking feels like an Olympic sport to me. Having a frying pan, a pot and the oven on at the same time is a circus of dinner preparation that I cannot seem to handle. Most of my cooking attempts involve multiple phone calls to my mother, as well as bouncing my eyes from the pan to the YouTube video I have pulled up on my laptop. I cooked rice for the first time a week ago, and I felt the same stress I feel when taking an exam.
So why am I, and many other millennials, challenged in the kitchen? One study cited by MarketWatch.com in “Why Millennials Don’t Know How to Cook,” states that it may be because many millennials still live at home. We don’t need to cook because Mom and Dad still do it for us. This could be due to millennials getting married later in life than our parents, as well as being burdened with student loan debt. However, neither of these excuses my own inability to cook well and often. I simply ignored my mother’s requests to teach me how to cook when I was growing up because I just was not interested. If only I’d known the struggle my future-self would be having!
For the time being, I will survive on pasta with jarred sauce and stir fry that almost kills me to prepare. I will also continue calling my mom with basic culinary questions and finding recipes on YouTube.
At least now I know I’m not alone.
Hey girl!! You are NOT alone by any means! Coming from someone who LOVES to cook and hasn't had a complaint from her husband yet the rest of life gets so busy and it is so much easier to say let's go out! If you just make it a point to be in the kitchen then it will happen a little at a time. Do you live in a dorm? You could initiate a cooking party! Kind of like a pot luck except you all cook together. I find it much easier to cook for a small gang.
ReplyDeleteKatie, that's a great idea about the cooking party! Yes, she does live in a dorm. It's a small kitchen but definitely do-able. She'll be moving to a new dorm next year, so maybe it'll be a bit bigger! :)
DeleteHi Michelle!
ReplyDeleteI remember that struggle to learn to fix a meal. It's much different than baking cookies or fixing mac & cheese (two of my staples when I was still living at home). Throw cooking for more than one person into the mix, and it's a huge learning curve!
But we all learn. Somehow the spaghetti noodles AND the sauce AND the vegetables AND the salad AND the garlic bread all land on the table at the same time!
And I think Katie's idea of a cooking party is a great one!
Yeah, Jan. I remember the hardest part was getting it to be ready at the same time. :)
DeleteWe've been gone all day to graduation! My oldest got his masters degree. We're really proud of him!
ReplyDeleteThis is Missy's daughter! I think I may be listed as "unknown" on here because I don't know how to work this thing lol. I have cooked for my roommate but have yet to cook for a group. Maybe I'll try that next year. I often accidentally cook proportions of food that could feed a village and just eat it over the course of a week because I have no intention of adding MATH to my cooking experience in order to get a single serving. :)
ReplyDeleteLOL! Well, I'm sure your roomie loves benefitting. :)
DeleteI still don't even know how to cook for 2! So it must take YEARS of practice to master that part. Let us know when you get the hang of it! Leftovers are great and if you don't want to eat it all in one week you could freeze them, if you have your own freezer space,and save a couple meals for a week (maybe finals week?) when you don't have time to cook, but still want something home cooked!
DeleteKatie, that's a great idea! Next school year, we should get her a nice set of freezer containers that can go right in the microwave. We got some for my son when he graduated and moved into his apartment. I think he takes leftovers to work for lunches.
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