What's Cooking, Sugar? by Sierra

What's Cooking, Sugar? by Sierra - January 2023 Scholarship Essay

Cooking isn’t a hard thing to teach, but it is a hard thing to learn. Most people are taught by their parents from a young age by parents or grandparents, but some people don’t learn at all. They know how to pour cereal and make sure their toast isn’t burnt. What they don’t know how to do is make tortellini bake or orange chicken and rice even if they’re following a recipe. It may turn out raw or underdone and neither of those factors are conducive to a healthy, edible dinner. What they could learn in this class is how to make bread or brownies from scratch, even an easy, 20-minute meal they may feed someone else one day. If they were given a take-home recipe book, they might feed their families while they’re living at home. It may even help out college students who are struggling with eating full, healthy meals by giving them the possibility of making something else. When they’re grown and out of college, living with roommates or married, it’ll give them something to make then, too. They’ll use it to make food for their friends and even their little ones.

A few weeks ago, a friend and I made brownies. We followed the instructions on the box and put the correct time according to the pan size. However, when the time was up, the brownies were still underdone. We put them back in for a minute. Another minute. Five more minutes. We had done something wrong, the brownies were still gooey (even if they were edible, albeit messy). Most teenagers-- and even young adults-- don’t know how to cook or know how they’re ruining the food. Theoretically, following instructions should be easy. But if you factor in elevation and humidity, food can be ruined with a few minutes of overcooking or undercooking. If cooking were taught as a nonnegotiable, you-must-take-it-to-pass class, microwaveable ready-made meals wouldn’t be such a menace. College students wouldn’t subsist on ramen noodles if they knew how to make chicken alfredo without having pink chicken and crunchy pasta.

Cooking should be a class because right now it isn’t, and some people are suffering the effects of it. Home Economics taught the most basic things like cakes or soups, and it wasn’t solely focused on cooking. If there were a class that we had to incorporate into schools, it should be teaching students how to take care of themselves now and in the future. Some students don’t have parents they can rely on to take care of them or teach them so the teachers should help, even minorly. Cooking is a major life skill that each and every one of them will utilize in the future. Not only will it literally keep them alive, but it will also remove the stress of not knowing how to make breakfast, lunch, or dinner.