Cookery classes to be compulsory (in England)

misteralz

Yep, or at least it was when I was at school. Think it was only the first two years of secondary it was compulsory in, though. We had to do sewing and stuff like that too. Home Economics, it was called.

Ina

It all depends on how the cookery classes are held, too...

My friend M was telling me how her son was more or less put off cooking by his first experience of it at school. On the agenda was "egg salad".

The teacher boiled the eggs (obviously, this is far too dangerous stuff to let the kids do!). He or she obviously hadn't read Delia's famous book, and they were VERY hard boiled - in fact they were black inside.

The kids then assembled a salad in class, and each put it into a little plastic tub to take home. By the end of the day, after the salad had sat in the tub for hours in the warmth, the lid had risen suspiciously. When my friend's son proudly opened the tub at the dinner table at home, it went "pouff" or something similar, and stank to high heaven. Well. How not to teach children to cook.

I think, the eating should be part of the cookery classes - maybe kids would even learn that it is possible to eat without having the telly on and balancing a plastic tray on your knees?

zombiecazz

They would really have to revamp the ciriculum.
My DS is a veggie. He does try meat, but just can't take the taste and texture. Every main course they cooked at school had only a meat option, but we did manage to get him allowed to make a veggie burger instead of a beef one in school. Off course I had to source the recipe and prep the ingredients. But in the end he was very proud of the burgers and everyone thought they tasted great.

They need real food that they would cook at home and basic skills. Like how to make a white sauce and what you can do with it. But not a bechamel sauce with the blinking studded onion.

wildgarlic

We did home ec for the first two years - then we could choose to keep it up or leave it. I kept it up and we did all kinds of interesting stuff... had to look at the calories and the preparation of the basic raw ingredients.

fish mornay, liver and bacon risotto, steak pie, chicken and mushroom pie, tuna and sweetcorn plait, scotch eggs, bread, pineapple upside down cake - even percolated coffee and properly brewed tea were included. My mum and dad LOVED cookery day because we all shared it when we got home... and yes, we had made a full meal quantity too.

I'll never forget making flaky pastry from scratch - it took AGES.

We discussed the shopping list the week before - and woe betide you if you forgot! The nun that taught us cookery was very strict and not many of us forgot things

I don't remember a lot of vegetarian dishes, but I'm sure that there were some.

lor138

As said before, Home Economics was compulsory for the first 2 yrs with us.
Still annoys me that we were taught how to make a cheesecake, truffles and loads of fancy tat that we didn't really need rather than steak and tatties etc. Lucky I've got a great mum who taught me how to cook anyway, but I'm sure there are plenty of classmates who never got anything from those classes to take into adulthood with them.

One of our HE teachers was a vegetarian and she taught us a brilliant veg lasagne recipe in 5th year that i still make now. OH's favourite!
Shame she wasn't our usual HE teacher!!!

jaydee67

My kids were all taught HE in the first 2 years of secondary. My youngest is still at that stage - his brother did a cookery skills course in 5th or 6th year and his sister did a standard grade. All my children have/ do cook at home - my 13 year old son made stew and tatties tonight - and all have entered the local show with their baking since they were six. I refused to do anything for them except supply the ingredients and use the oven until they were old enough - all measuring and mixing were done by them.

Ina

My friend (the one I mentioned above) introduced a system at home where her husband and son each had to cook tea once per week... Have to ask her next time I see her whether they are still doing that! I somehow don't think so; every time I'm there the men seem to be waiting for her to get back from work/shopping/getting the washing done/feeding the sheep to cook the meal. Grrr! Oh, her husband doesn't work... And her son is at college now. Should still be able to do a minimum of cooking at home.

We never had anything like HE at school - but I did the cooking from a very early age at home, encouraged by my mother and by my own interest. My mum didn't have much time for fancy stuff, so she was glad I did the cooking when we had guests!

jaydee67

I did home ec at school, cookery and sewing for the first 2 years then cookery to Higher grade. I learnt a lot about nutrition and theory - and yes, I too remember making puff pastry from scratch - thank god for the packet stuff!

I make a meal from scratch most nights, oven chips, beans and eggs from the garden would be a junk food meal on nights when I am short of time. My children also all had great school dinners and appreciate food cooked from scratch. I grow some veg and my kids have all had growing space of their own to try different things. We eat local produce when possible - tonight we had local lamb and the potatoes came from the next island. We have birds for eggs but eat excess cockerals - had a nice chicken broth at the weekend. We don't all eat around the table every night, but we do on Sundays at least.

I can't understand the train of thought that home cooking is too expensive - a big pot of home made soup costs pence -and the children can be involved from an early age chopping veg.

Ina

wildgarlic

monkey nuts

My 7yr old does do cookery at school, this tends to be the usual rice crispy cakes etc, my 14yr old no longer does cookery (only up to yr S2 is compulsary) and says she is very good at making toast!! She really has no idea how to cook 'proper' food nor does she have any inclination to learn

On the other hand my (stay at home because of disability) 22 yr old son wants to learn to cook from scratch. I really enjoy cooking with him, this will be made much easier once we get some sort of high stool thingy from the OT soon

Ina

dizzyblond

I really like cooking with Graemes kids. I always go out of my way to make nice dinners when there here and quite often one or the other will want to help or have a go - I even rope Graeme in sometimes. His little lad is nine ( and fab) he loves to cook so I get it all set up and then get dad to help, I just hover and help when they're stuck - they have a ball together!!!! Its not so funny when it comes to clearing up time but watching them have quality time is worth it. And now the scrummy lad wants to learn to grow veg in the garden so he can cook his home grown stuff - bless him!!!!!!

lachlanandmarcus

We had to do Home Ec and it nearly turned me off cooking for life. The endless lectures on proteins and fats, the hitler like policing of exactness of measurements, the concentration on timings regardless of degree of readiness of the end result, I found it soul destroying and loathed it.

Thankfully my primary school where it was much more fun and my mum and garn had already taught me to cook and bake and to love it, and so I got through it.

I hope they take the cooking as fun approach not the too scientific route !

Julie

Here's a radical idea.....
Let's abandon it altogether and replace HE with Life Economics where such subjects as reuse and recycle could be taught alongside how to cook stuff that still has the dirt/blood/eyes etc left on. How to repair small appliances instead of throwing away and buying new.
If I was an employer, I would be impressed by someone who had high grades in such a subject because it would say a lot about them.

wildgarlic

That's a really good idea Julie!!

misteralz

Diana

Lord_Azrael

Yep, I did HE at school too and I think it's very worthwhile. But then I also think that a lot more practical subjects are necessary in schools. There's too much emphasis on subjects that, really, are very specialised.
I'm a great fan of PC's for instance, but would rather have learnt more practical things at school.

I left Secondary in England back in 1993, and they had recently got a small greenhouse, a small plot of land for growing a few veg and a couple of pigs in a shed. However, I only came into contact with this as I was in Boarding school and visited after school, there were very few who got the opportunity to be involved during the day.

I had heard that HE had stopped some years ago, I assume this is coming back now then?

More practical subjects for everyday life: Cooking, gardening, basic fixing things (DIY, plumbing etc.) would all be useful.

Fia

Like Lord Azrael, I too left school in England, albeit in 1973. We "young ladies"

were taught Housecraft - I have a GSE in it! The first lesson was how to make a pot of tea. I fully understand good tea-making is an art, but most of us were proficient in that anyway. What I wanted to learn was how to change a plug, how bank accounts/plumbing/electrics work, chop wood with an axe - still not mastered that one

My daughters and I cook together, often with their friends. It is a communal life-affirming activity imho. But not all parents don't have the interest / skills / time / physical space in their kitchens. And it's their kids who really need some education to break the cycle of not being connected with their food.

I fully agree with Julie that a more holistic approach to everyday skills would be wonderful. In the meantime I think we have to do our best to educate our children, and their friends, by example.

zombiecazz

was talking to a 16 yo last night who is doing a life skills course at school. cooking, banking, using public transport etc etc sounded great, but obviously only those kids not doing 5/6 highers would be doing it.
Need to take some of the emphasis of the academia and more onto living life.

wildgarlic

Sign Tracey Smith's petition -

Ina