Cooking With Kids: Do Your Kids Love Being In The Kitchen?

Are you a fan of TV cooking shows? Do you watch them with your kids?

If so, new research shows kids are starting to cook at a younger age thanks to the Jamie Oliver/Junior Masterchef/Great British Bake Off effect. BBC Good Food magazine conducted a survey of 1,349 parents and children, and found the combination of an abundance of TV cookery shows and a more relaxed attitude to household roles means that children are cooking from the age of 6, compared to an average of 10 years old for their parents’ generation. According to BBC Good Food magazine editor Gillian Carter: “It is easy to forget that for years home cooking was the preserve of the adult woman of the household, and often children were shooed out of the kitchen. Today cooking, inspired in part by television, is seen as something fun and practical. 50% of parents view it as an essential life skill.” One of the other main reasons many parents say they like cooking with kids is to spend quality time together (75%) and I can wholeheartedly agree with that. My kids love ‘helping’ in the kitchen with everything from whipping eggs, to making cakes and pasta dishes. Aside from their joy at being allowed to help, I’m told by my 6 year old’s teacher that getting kids to learn to cook is a good way to teach them about science and how ingredients can change form, which means it’s fun and educational which is a winner. All that aside, I cook with my kids because I am secretly hoping they become so enthralled by the idea of cooking meals that I can eventually give it up completely and hand it over to them! So are your kids mini chefs too? Do they also love cooking with you? Let us know.

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