Explain this Paradox.

[Jkid]

If your peers in high school told you that cooking is for girls, how come in real life many chefs are males?

They're implying that if you want real food you rather have someone cook it for you, preferably a female if not in a fast food restaurant or regular sit-down restaurant, instead of cooking it yourself.

[hippywife]

1. There is truly only one explanation...

misogyny. Well, there is also stupidity, but then that kinda goes without saying, doesn't it?

[Warpy]

2. One of the times I left my mother speechless

was after she told me all the best cooks were men. I told her she left out a word: all the best paid cooks are men.

[Duer 157099]

3. I've been thinking about this lately too

I have a teenage son and I try really hard to impart my love for food and cooking to him, but he's one of those who has it in his head that it's not a "guy" thing. No matter what I say, no matter how much I try to prove otherwise. Teens can be stubborn that way, lol.

But I keep plodding along, forcing him to participate in learning some kitchen skills, because I *know* that in a few years, he's going to really appreciate knowing them, and all of his friends will too. Last week after he begged me to make some salsa for him, I made him come learn how to do it himself. I'm trying to do this more often but it's hard to compete with The Xbox.

I'd really like to see him get interested in cooking, but so far I don't see it (waaaah!).

[EFerrari]

7. Neither of my sons were big macho types but it was that one that leans that way

that also loved cooking. It just became one of the arts that he practices but at the time, I remember he used to tell his frineds that he was "helping Mom out'. That worked. :)

[grasswire]

8. get him a copy of Esquire magazine's articles...

....that teach a young man how to impress women with a repertoire of selected simple classic dishes. Spaghetti carbonara. Pancakes. Etc.

[Denninmi]

4. well,

speaking as a guy who likes food and who likes to cook, I see absolutely no reason that any kid, male or female, shouldn't learn the joys of the culinary arts.

I guess I find it a little disappointing that kids today are still caught in rigid sexual stereotypes.

Now, my father was like this -- he couldn't boil a cup of water, because it was beneath his dignity as a man or something. Which I guess is one of the reasons I enjoyed learning to cook from my mother -- it pissed him off, and we didn't get along so well during my teen years.

Seems to me that necessity is the mother of invention in this case - if they won't learn to cook for themselves, stop feeding them. They'll soon figure out that it's pretty handy to have some life skills like being able to cook your own dinner.

[Jkid]

6. So that's what I assumed all these years...

Manhood.

[The empressof all]

5. I'm not so sure if it's mired in sexual identity

My daughter who grew up with two parents who love to cook and who are food obsessed has absolutely no interest in learning to cook. I've tried to drag her into the kitchen since she was a child and constructed all sorts of fun activities from making candy to steaming clams (Her favorite food when she was a child). She has no interest.

She'd rather eat a ramen or a frozen dinner than prepare something "fresh" for herself. :shrug: Go figure.

[tango-tee]

9. I didn't want to learn how to cook, simply because it was expected of girls.

As I was growing up and was expected to learn "womanly" skills, there were some things that just stuck in my craw.

Our next door neighbors had a son who was also my best buddy, and our families were really close. His mom was a wonderful cook (just like my mom), but for some reason he preferred eating at our house, just like I would regularly go next door to have dinner there. No invitation needed from either side, we just showed up at dinnertime.

But - and here comes the Big But for me: I was expected to help wash the dishes after I had dinner next door. And I was also expected to help wash dishes and clean the kitchen after dinner at our house. My buddy would eat at his house or ours - and flop down on the sofa afterwards, no questions asked, no need to help with anything. And *that* was precisely what made me go on strike as a teenager when it came to anything having to do with cooking or whatever kind of household work. Why was I as a girl expected to help in the kitchen, when a boy wasn't? Who knows, perhaps that also influenced my choice of a career as a jet engine mechanic, not exactly a typically female occupation in the early 1980s.

I was in my late twenties when I finally took an interest in cooking. I've always loved good food, and once I "saw the light" when I was on my own, there was no stopping.

Hope I didn't get too much off topic....

BTW, my buddy now owns a small hotel in Tuscany, Italy. And he has become one of the best cooks I've ever known.

Cheers.

:toast:

[randr]

10. No paradox here

Teenagers do not live in real life.