If you can read you can cook?

If you can read you can cook?????

There was a time in my life that I repeatedly said, “If you can read you can cook.”  I am rethinking that theory.

Do you want to know why?  Well, you are my captive audience if you are looking at this post so; I am going to tell you.

Cooking and baking has a vocabulary.  It was once assumed that folks in the kitchen would be around someone in their life that cooks or cooked or baked on a regular basis.  Through those individuals one would learn that vocabulary.

This is no longer true.  One can no longer assume that a child or adult knows what the term “cream” means when mixing cookies or cake.  One cannot assume that a child knows they must brown the hamburger before they put it in the chili.  One cannot assume that a metal bowl is for mixing NOT cooking on the stove top.  One cannot assume that everyone knows the bottom of a broiling pan is not a baking sheet.  I know these things because I have experienced many a kitchen disaster.  As FACS educators my co-workers and I have come to prepare for the worst and expect the best in product.

For me and my colleagues this feels like it should be job security.  Yet, it worries me because many people still have the mentality that cooking should be easy enough to learn on your own, or that everyone still cooks at home or that it is should just be done.  Something that we often forget is that assembling food is chemistry and when things are not measured correctly or assembled correctly it just doesn’t work.

If you don’t know how to cook or bake and you are an adult, what should you do?  Read, read, read.  Watch you tube videos, watch cooking shows.  But DO start cooking and baking because the processed food and restaurant food that we are consuming is not good for the function or nutrition of you or your family.

Be brave and step into the “cooking and baking” zone!

My message, SUPPORT the field of “Family and Consumer Sciences” we are a vital part of continued healthy education in our society.  I would love to say that someday we could work ourselves out of a job but I don’t think so.  We teach about many things involving consumerism, textiles, housing, family, conflict and resolutions, children and much more.  We touch many corners and stages of lives.  We are practical, resourceful educators and that makes us vital.

 

CREAM=incorporating air into a fat and sugars until they are smooth and creamy.

BROWN=Frying or sauté` meat until it is brown in color for lamb, pork, or beef or cream white color if poulty.

SAUCE PAN, DUTCH OVEN, FRYING=Cookware using on stove tops.

BROILING PAN=Item used for direct heat cooking.  Often used for meats.

NOTE!:  CRACK your oven when you broil with an electric oven.  This prevents fire.