Food evolution (bit of a rant and a question) page 2

[Neckhammer]

Alton Brown for the geeky cooking win!

And yeah, we do gardening and lots of cooking in my house. The kids will learn . Heck my oldest is a 5 year old boy and I already have him work with me in the kitchen. Sure he's not handling the butcher knife yet, but he can mix and pour and carry stuff. I'm even getting some chickens this spring. Getting back in touch with your food supply is a good thing.

[EagleRiverDee]

The trend is very sad.

Personally I enjoy cooking. I have expensive tastes in food- I love things like steak, lobster, shrimp, crab. It's a heck of a lot cheaper, when I'm going to indulge, to buy it at the store and cook it myself. The markup at restaurants is unreal! So that drove me to learn to cook, but by no means do I always eat high end. I have lots of hamburger, fish and chicken recipes too. But food generally tastes better when it's homecooked, and it doesn't have all the crap in it. I'm always experimenting and if I see something that looks good on Ciao Chow or in a magazine I often will try it. I'll even try to duplicate restaurant meals, if I like them enough.

My step-son literally can't properly cook an egg. His idea of cooking involves turning the stove to the highest possible setting, and cooking the food at the fastest possible speed- even if that results in a scorched, inedible piece of cardboard. When he moves out, I'm positive he'll be living off fast food and microwave meals.

[Rusty]

Growing up, I knew how to cook all the standards, Kraft Mac n Cheese, Rice-a-Roni, toast with lots of margarine. My Mom didn't cook. She was a waitress, and just couldn't stand the thought of serving anther meal, so we ate out A LOT (wonder how I got so fat?).

When I was a teenager, I found Chef Boy Ardee's Spaghetti dinner in a box. I realized that I could make the same thing with noodles and spaghetti sauce (add my own meat). Then, as I started learning about whole foods, I started making my own sauce. That was the flood gates opening toward cooking from scratch.

After that, I started making my own bread, cookies, cakes, ect. Although all my foods have changed since going Paleo, I am not afraid to try something new, from scratch.

In the end, it's a learning process.

[AuroraB]

The trend is very sad.

.... But food generally tastes better when it's homecooked, and it doesn't have all the crap in it...

True. True. True. When my two oldest kids are on visitation with the dad they eat fast food and junk the whole time. He doesn't know how to cook jack! When they get back home, my daughter practically begs for a huge home-cooked meal cuz she's so sick of fast food. Usually wanting roast, mashed cauliflower, steamed vegetables & homemade bread (rest of family still eats grain)