Are we creating a new generation of kids who think cooking is stressful, complicated, requires flash equipment, fancy ingredients, a huge amount of skill and lots of time??

If you read Claire’s latest newsletter  Kids just wanna have fun you will see she finds it entertaining but gets turned off by high pressure, high stress cooking. Whilst not having done any formal research, I suggest this is a typical response from many kids.

In the UK they call it ‘food porn’ – Brits love to watch it, but few take action. Undoubtedly all these food programs bring a heightened awareness of food – and that is a good thing – but the subliminal messages to kids is ‘cooking is scary’. We need a reassuring approach for 99% of kids who don’t aspire to be chefs but need encouraged to whip up a meal.

How can we help your teen?
Claire’s teen-to-teen newsletter and her blog builds trust with teens to inspire and engage. We are not just about recipes and cooking.  We offer the whole package – an ordinary teen role model (not a chef) to inspire, encourage and kids to take responsibility for what they eat.  Who’s Cooking Tonight? is a key resource.

How can we help you?
Check out the work we did with groups of teens to discover what parents could do to make kids want to cook. It’s advice you can’t afford to ignore.

WeCan! (Ways to Enhance Children’s Activity and Nutrition), is a science-based national education program from the American National Institutes of Health (NIH), which aims to help children ages 8-13 stay at a healthy weight. Most western countries face very similar issues – it appears to me that lack of food skills knows no international barriers!!?

WeCan! have some great tips which are all along the Eat Well and Move More concept – they have a tip sheet that I think is pretty cool – alternatively scan through these ideas and share with your kids – (and yourself?? – we all benefit from this!!)…

• Drink water before a meal.
• Avoid food portions larger than your fist.
• Eat off smaller plates.
• Eat before grocery shopping.
• Choose a checkout line without a candy display.

Moving More Tips:
• Go for a half-hour walk instead of watching TV.
• Take the stairs instead of the escalator.
• Acknowledge your efforts with non-food related rewards, such as a family day at the park, lake, or zoo.

For the full tip sheet from WeCan!

Claire, my teenage daughter who hosts www.itsmyturntocooktonight.com, has put her comments next to these tips in her blog – the succinct nature of these tips really appealed to her and she felt they were things she could do without much effort – she did however have to put the qualifying comment regarding the TV watching – as long as it wasn’t her fave program she would buy into it! See Claires blog.

I wrote this post as a participant in the Eat, Play, Love blog carnival hosted by Meals Matter and Dairy Council of California to share ideas on positive and fun ways to teach children healthy eating habits. A list of other registered dietitians and moms who are participating in the carnival will be listed at the bottom of this post or can be found on Meals Matter.

As more and more research backs up  that children who can cook are more likely to make better food choices, the case for teaching  your child to cook  gets even more relevant.

As parents, we intuitively want to do the best for our kids  - and often we start off with great gusto only to run out of steam if what we are doing isn’t getting great results. I ran a couple of focus groups with teens to find out the sort of things we could do to  make them want want to cook. What we found out was seriously enlightening, somewhat amusing and really helpful!

We discovered eight key points… (I still struggle to keep a straight face when I recall how deadly serious they were!?!) These points could verge on being precocious – but it certainly helps us as parents if we know what they are thinking!

In their words, this is what parents should do…

1. Let me choose what I cook – “Simple – if I don’t like it, I’m not going to want to cook it”.

2. Get me a recipe that works – “If I go to the effort of cooking I want it to work… I don’t want have to have to keep running to you to ask what to do next”.

3. Have all the ingredients - “Don’t expect me to be able to substitute ingredients when I am just starting off on this cooking lark!”

4. Stay out of the kitchen – “Don’t be a helicopter hovering around. Give me some space to work things out – but stick around the house in case I need to ask”.

5. Resist ‘you should have’ comments’ – “If I want to know I’ll ask”.

6. Be impressed – “If you expect me to do this again you need to be impressed , so you might have to ‘fake it ‘til I make it’. And don’t go telling all your friends if I burn something or do something stupid”.

7. Don’t nag – “If I take a bit longer than you do or I don’t clean up exactly like you do, cut me some slack – I have just cooked you a meal!”

8. Cut me a deal! – “If you expect me to buy into this ‘cook a meal once a week idea’ there has to be something in it for me .  This ‘skills for a lifetime’ doesn’t really flick my switch – but money for the movies or that new dress does. You are probably going to buy me new shoes at some stage anyway, you may as well make me think I have earned them.”

I am totally convinced of the benefits of kids being able to cook.Your child doesn’t need to be a budding chef,  even a repertoire of half a dozen meals sets them well ahead of many kids.

Being able to cook will help  to set your child up to take responsibility for what they eat. The fantastic bonus is that  every time they cook,  you can get a night off cooking and  they get skills to last a lifetime  - a win:win for everyone!!

Don't stop here! Join the carnival and read other Eat, Play, Love blogs from dietitians and moms offering the best advice on raising healthy eaters. And if you don't get enough today, for more positive, realistic and actionable advice from registered dietitian moms, register for the free, live webinar Eat, Play, Love: Raising Healthy Eaters on Wednesday, May 18.

The Best-Kept Secret for Raising Healthy Eaters, Maryann Jacobsen, MS, RD
Feeding is Love, Jill Castle, MS, RD, LDN
5 Quick Ways to Prepare Veggies with Maximum Flavor, Dayle Hayes, MS, RD
The Art of Dinnertime, Elana Natker, MS, RD
Children Don’t Need a Short Order Cook, Christy Slaughter
Cut to the Point – My Foodie Rules, Glenda Gourley
Eat, Play, Love – A Challenge for Families, Alysa Bajenaru, RD
Eat, Play, Love ~ Raising Healthy Eaters, Kia Robertson
Get Kids Cooking, Jessica Fishman Levinson, MS, RD, CDN
Kid-Friendly Kitchen Gear Gets Them Cooking, Katie Sullivan Morford, MS, RD
Kids that Can Cook Make Better Food Choices, Glenda Gourley
Making Mealtime Fun, Nicole Guierin, RD
My No Junk Food Journey – Want to Come Along? , Kristine Lockwood
My Recipe for Raising Healthy Eaters: Eat Like the French, Bridget Swinney MS, RD, LD
Playing with Dough and the Edible Gift of Thyme, Robin Plotkin, RD, LD
Picky Eaters  Will Eat Vegetables, Theresa Grisanti, MA
Raising a Healthy Eater, Danielle Omar, MS, RD
Putting the Ease in Healthy Family Eating, Connie Evers, MS, RD, LD
Raising Healthy Eaters Blog Carnival & Chat Roundup, Ann Dunaway Teh, MS, RD, LD
Soccer Mom Soapbox, Sally Kuzemchak, MS, RD
Teenagers Can Be Trying But Don’t Give UpDiane Welland MS, RD
What My Kids Taught Me About Eating Mindfully, Michelle May, MD

When it comes to cooking and passing on food skills – what sorts of things do you want for your child??

We now clearly have two lines of strategy and communication…

• adult to adult (www.TeachChildrenToCook.com –  you are here!!)
• teen to teen (www.ItsMyTurnToCookTonight.com)

These both work in tandem to support each other.  I think the easiest way to share what we are doing is to show you diagrammatically… (if the font is too small for you to read , just click on them to enlarge)

So off each site we have two blogs, two newsletters, some specific resources and also a lot that are in common – like the cookbooks, YouTubes.

Vision : to help parents and teachers teach kids to cook

Vision : to inspire teenagers to cook

I really value the feedback and suggestions, so please ‘ keep your ideas coming’ …  This is such a big and important area to tackle, I can use all the help you can offer!!

Glenda Gourley

As I reflect back on 2010 I realize just how far this teenage cooking project has come. It has been a very steep learning curve for Claire and I – in fact at times I think it is so steep I have needed a rope – and sometimes even crampons!?

Of all the research and focus groups, the most poignant was the work we did to find out what teens think parents had to do if they wanted their kids to cook. We discovered eight key points… (I still struggle to keep a straight face when I recall how deadly serious they were!?!) These points could verge on being precocious – but it certainly helps us as parents if we know what they are thinking!

In their words, this is what parents should do…

1. Let me choose what I cook

2. Get me a recipe that works

3. Have all the ingredients

4. Stay out of the kitchen

5. Resist ‘you should have’ comments

6. Be impressed

7. Don’t nag

8. Cut me a deal!

I thought the points were so vital that Claire made a video clip to share with you…

I am really excited about 2011. There are so many kids eager to get into the kitchen and cook a decent meal. And from the feedback we are continually getting, so many parents keen to encourage kids take charge. Part of it is about ‘letting go and letting our kids get on with it…

Success teaching cooking with children is much more likely if you start off with foods that they really like. In my experience I have found that it is ideal to start with easy kids recipes using familiar foods, like potatoes, which have a wealth of redeeming features. The vast majority of teenagers love the taste of potatoes so you are pitching to a receptive audience.

Taste, ease, nutrition and budget may be high on an adult’s radar of what influences a decision to cook. However, issues like being able impress friends, being able to make yourself look good by having healthy skin, being at a healthy weight, choosing foods which are sustainable, even having recipes electronically rather than on paper – are likely to be jamming the radar of a teenager.

Potatoes have many positive features, being the worlds third biggest food crop their availability and acceptance is well entrenched. The huge advantage of potatoes is that no matter where you live you will always be able to buy locally grown – a feature which has much appeal for our environmentally savvy teens.

From an international perspective potatoes really shine out on a whole raft of environmental issues. The potato plant produces more nutritious food more quickly, on less land, and in harsher climates than any other major crop. Potatoes also require significantly less water to grow than other carbohydrates. On average, it takes 3,000 litres of water to grow 1kg of rice, 500 litres to grow 1kg of wheat and 75 litres for 1kg of potatoes. Plant utilisation is efficient as up to 85% of the potato plant is edible human food, compared to around 50% in cereals.

So when you consider production capability, sustainability and use of world resources it is little wonder that teaching teenagers to cook by using this remarkable food is so effective. For those keen to do their bit for the planet, eating locally grown potatoes is a step in the right direction.

Perhaps of more relevance to adults who want to teach healthy meals for kids is their nutritional status. If you had to write a nutritional CV for potatoes you’d have a rather bulging document. The assets of this rather plain-looking vegetable which is sometimes referred to as humble, show clearly that in nutrition terms they are clearly anything but.

Put succinctly, potatoes are amazingly nutrient and phytonutrients rich, bursting with vitamins and minerals, are virtually fat free, contain no cholesterol and when served in their skins are a great source of fibre. Potatoes have a high satiety index which means they have a key role to play in weight control as they make you feel full for longer.

Versatility also stands out. Whilst a child likes familiarity of foods, they do not want to be bored. Many dishes have potatoes in them, from awesome filled baked potatoes, scrummy soup, to-die-for wedges, to a huge range of salads. Additionally there is the universal attraction that children have for roast, boiled and mashed potatoes.

So why should you start teaching easy kids recipes with potatoes? It’s simple really.

1. They like the taste.
2. No matter where you live, they are readily available at affordable prices.
3. They are great for the planet.
4. They are great for them.
5. They are familiar and able to be cooked in many ways.

The most important thing is that once a child gains confidence with a food that they like, they will venture on to other foods. Let’s get these kids having some fun, enjoying what they cook, feeling the benefits of eating healthy food and racking up a few successes!

A study just released on US teens is scary, alarming and galvanizes my thoughts and intent about teaching kids to cook!

The problem seems to be pretty much the same worldwide -  the trend to reliance on fast foods and kids not being able, or motivated, to fix a meal shows no sign of abating.

For some sobering reading check this out – but don’t get too depressed – there are some simple things you can do to counter this influence and encourage your kids to get some food skills  … and  you are in the right place to find them!

US adolescents get a fifth of their calories from fast food, study finds.

A study of the 12 largest fast food chains in the United States has criticised the energy, sugar, fat, and sodium content in the foods they market to children. Its authors hope that a combination of public outrage and the threat of new laws and enforcement of existing laws on truth in advertising may bring about the changes they seek.

The report, by the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale University, was presented on 8 November at the 138th annual meeting of the American Public Health Association in Denver.

It found that every day a third of US children and teenagers eat fast food; it is the source of 16-17% of the energy intake of adolescents.

for the rest of the report

I have long pondered the differing motivations to learn to cook – but when it all boils down to it – does it matter if the outcomes are the same??? Have a look at these little clips to compare why I think its a good idea for kids to cook and then compare it with what Claire thinks… differing trigger points… the same outcome!

Claire’s reasons

My reasons… ( perspective of parent and nutrition educator…)

When all said and done – as long as they have a go we are making progress!!