My 9yo watches every episode of whatever cooking competition is on and now wants to actually cook. I'm not a great cook ngl but we've made cookies, pizza dough, and last weekend she actually made a decent stir-fry. She's so focused and careful about it - totally different from other activities. Is this actually useful or am I just letting her watch TV and calling it productive? lol
Get him in the kitchen! Mine wanted to cook after watching Top Chef and now he can make a decent stir fry. The confidence boost from actually making food is huge for kids that age.
My 9yo is the same way. Just know that cooking WITH kids takes way longer and makes more mess than doing it yourself. But the memories are worth it.
This is actually awesome though. My 10yo watches those baking shows and now she wants to learn for real. We started doing Sunday morning pancake sessions together and honestly it's become our thing.
Start simple with him. We did basic stuff like scrambled eggs and pasta first. Watching a cooking show and actually executing are two different things so managing expectations helps.
to join the conversation.
Be prepared for some failed experiments. My daughter tried making 'gourmet' mac and cheese once and it was basically inedible. But she learned something and wants to try again so that's the win.