Over the darker winter months Tetbury Youth Club has taken the opportunity to complete lots of cooking activities with our groups. Cooking allows young people to develop physical skills, nutritional education, interests in new foods and ingredients and a sense of accomplishment and pride when something is created together and shared by all. What we make is led by the requests and interests of our groups and whereas some like to immerse themselves fully in a recipe, others prefer just to prepare more simple things like wraps and toasties.
Cooking is a wonderful way to spend time with your teen, it gives you an opportunity to spend quality time together and a chance to check in with them and see what is going on in their worlds. Often just by standing side by side, and being busy with a shared task such as chopping or peeling, conversation flows a little easier and they may be encouraged to talk about some of the things that are going on for them.
Cooking together does not have to be complicated or expensive, pizza toast is a firm favourite of the groups at our youth club where they take either just a slice of bread or a section of a baguette, top it with passata, cheese and the fresh toppings of their choice and grill it!. The most important thing is that it should be fun, relaxing and an opportunity for quality time together.
If you want to encourage your teen to cook with you, start simply. Get them to do simple tasks like peeling vegetables or stirring the pan, to spark their interest without overwhelming them.
Pick foods they like. They’re more likely to be interested in helping if they have the incentive of eating their favourite meal.
Cooking and the ability to make positive choices when it comes to food is an essential life skill. Whilst it can be tempting in a busy household to do everything for our teens, take the time to think about how great it would be if they could safely plan, shop for, prepare and serve a meal and the boost in their self- confidence that this would give them.