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Your teen food prep memory


shootingstar

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Was it flipping burgers or eggs? Or eating --until you had to cook for survival after leaving parents?

To start off, we never cooked dinner on our own in mother's kitchen. She always wanted control the kitchen...except when we did baking which she gracefully stepped aside.

However I did help her string up marinated meat to dry: Chinese Cured Pork Belly (Cantonese Lap yuk) - The Woks of Life  Kinda messy initially...dripping soy marinade from hanging meat slices..

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Mostly prep like peeling potatoes or carrots while mom did all the cooking. She used kitchen time as a retreat and preferred that we weren’t around. Clean up was a daughter thing, though. My sister and I had a job starting with sweep the floor and take out trash, to help dry dishes, to eventually do the washing. 

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I remember my mom being on call and at the hospital..called me and gave me instructions..I think for a pork roast on the weekend...It turned out great...I always helped in the kitchen..but I pretty much did the meal on my own that day...

My sister was not a cook or a baker..I still remember she made blue frosting for a ginger cake..and used granulated sugar :wacko:...

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21 minutes ago, MoseySusan said:

Mostly prep like peeling potatoes or carrots while mom did all the cooking. She used kitchen time as a retreat and preferred that we weren’t around. Clean up was a daughter thing, though. My sister and I had a job starting with sweep the floor and take out trash, to help dry dishes, to eventually do the washing. 

You know what: the whole time growing up, we had 2 dishracks on the counter forever. We piled the handwashed dishes there to dry....... :D  That's how my mother dealt with many dishes for a large family.  I used to think for the longest  while, drying dishes seemed..so proper, quaint.  

I'm sure others would think my mother and family was lazy.. She needed her sanity habits and our kitchen was tight spaced because also our kitchen table where whole family ate. We never had a dining room.

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5 minutes ago, Zealot said:

At a certain point, I was 13, my mom and my stepfather both worked and I was left to be responsible for my four younger siblings living at home.  I learned to cook. 

I was not allowed to turn on the stove, when no parent was at home when I was under 16 yrs. I was expected to stay out  of the kitchen and look after younger siblings elsewhere in the house. My parents really truly were fire/burn /cutting knife safety conscious or paranoid.

So 1/2 of time it...was watching tv. :lol:

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I learned to cook making breakfast foods.  In my early mid teens my mom would take sabbaticals to Holland so I had to fend for my self. Sometimes I made meals, sometimes I ate garbage.  But I learned to feed myself.  

MP’s worked shift work so were given “Sep Rats” or food money.  I drank a lot of my food money but if not eating in the mess hall ate a lot of baloney sandwiches & spaghettio’s. 

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42 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

Was it flipping burgers or eggs? Or eating --until you had to cook for survival after leaving parents?

To start off, we never cooked dinner on our own in mother's kitchen. She always wanted control the kitchen...except when we did baking which she gracefully stepped aside.

However I did help her string up marinated meat to dry: Chinese Cured Pork Belly (Cantonese Lap yuk) - The Woks of Life  Kinda messy initially...dripping soy marinade from hanging meat slices..

I never learned to cook much until I left home.  Even into my 40's, when I needed 5 pounds of my father's excellent German style potato salad for a departmental, pre-holiday feast at work, I asked him to make it.  After he passed away, I had to consult with his one surviving sister to get a couple hints from their German-ancestry mother's recipes before I stumbled on the right recipe (beginning with equal parts of mayo and vinegar).

Polish recipes: I didn't start making myself until after my mother passed away.  Fortunately the Polish-American lady next door (the one who died this week) showed me how to make great stuffed cabbage and some excellent-cooks among my Polish-American relatives who taught me how to make various Polish dishes.

I really began to cook very well only after I retired at age 56.  My background in synthetic chemistry research, where sometimes I would vary the amount of one chemical or temperature or volume, etc. at a time over weeks, repeating the process over and over, to find the best synthetic method to make various compounds, helped me in cooking: I write my recipes down and do the same thing.  Using a little more or less of one ingredient, cooking for more or less time, pressure cooking or stovetop or oven, trying out one different seasoning, etc., updating them as time goes on.

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I did work in a fast food place the last year of high school and first two years of college until I got a job on campus in chemistry research.

Our Gino's chain had the Maryland franchise for KFC chicken.  I made that, worked the grill, and worked french fries.

Before I moved away from my parents house, a political club I belonged to needed someone to run the kitchen. I was told I didn't need to be able to cook, just supervise, order the food for occasions - dances, weddings, etc. - when a lot of food was going to be served.

Eventually, I learned how to cook a lot of things for 200 people: how many gallons of milk and butter to go with how many gallons of oysters, etc. to make oyster stew, etc. But I didn't know how to cook for a small number of people!

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8 minutes ago, Zealot said:

I grew up in the heart of Appalachia. It’s the way things were. Kids in their early their teens were shooting rifles (hunting), and skinning animals.  We burned fires in wood stoves, cooked on gas stoves, operated farm vehicles and roamed for miles without supervision or worry.  

My father was a restaurant cook as the breadwinner the whole of his working life. So acute awareness of boiling water, frying, etc.

Usually 1 child went with mother to pull home grocery buggy/carry groceries with her. So myself or next sibling was looking after 4 younger siblings down to baby crawling at home while mom and 1 kid went shopping. My father was working during afternoon until 1:00 am. There were 2 years he lived away from a home, in a dorm for workers. We didn't have a car at that time, Zealot.

Parents didn't want us outside with younger kids playing when neither or them weren't home. It really was safety for us.  I did know of someone who lost her baby brother when he ran across the road and the car hit him.  We lived on 1 way street near downtown core...not out in the country.

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Shucking peas and snap beans were how I was first put to work in the kitchen. 
 

My first job was bus boy, and I worked the kitchens in boarding school. 
In college I found the best restaurant within cycling distance of campus and brought in a chocolate pumpkin strudel  as my resume. I made my way with a ladle and knife until I was about 28 when I swapped to the front of the house as a barkeep. I’ve done about every job in the restaurant industry save owner. 

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3 minutes ago, Zealot said:

My step father worked in a quarry. My mom worked various retail positions.  They both often pulled long days. Mom sometimes worked late evenings. When they met and married, I was 7. My mom did not have a car up to that point. Until their marriage, my mom was a single mother of 5. When they married he bright 8 children with him. That made 13 kids living in a very small house. The oldest of the kids did not stay long.  There were lots of problems. I won’t go into it, but police, social workers and juve were often involved. Several kids wound up in prison, juvenile detention and others got shuffled around.  By the time I was 13, I was the oldest still at home regularly. And it fell in me to watch after the younger ones. 

We all have unique upbringings. 

Peace

I never knew any of that. We need to do another week long ride.

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My Grandmother was too controlling about her kitchen.  I didn't cook a thing myself until I was out of the house.  Self-taught here.  I did watch her a lot.  There were chores like help pluck ducks, scrub abalone.  Never liked those jobs. Also, helped remove buckshot from the birds.  That was worse.

21 minutes ago, shootingstar said:

I was not allowed to turn on the stove, when no parent was at home when I was under 16 yrs. I was expected to stay out  of the kitchen and look after younger siblings elsewhere in the house. My parents really truly were fire/burn /cutting knife safety conscious or paranoid.

So 1/2 of time it...was watching tv. :lol:

I never turned on a stove, until I had my own.  So crazy. 

Could not drive until I was 18 either.  They would not sign the approval slip.  Had to leave home right after my 17th b day to leave the crazy.

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12 hours ago, Dirtyhip said:

My Grandmother was too controlling about her kitchen.  I didn't cook a thing myself until I was out of the house.  Self-taught here.  I did watch her a lot.  There were chores like help pluck ducks, scrub abalone.  Never liked those jobs. Also, helped remove buckshot from the birds.  That was worse.

I never turned on a stove, until I had my own.  So crazy. 

Could not drive until I was 18 either.  They would not sign the approval slip.  Had to leave home right after my 17th b day to leave the crazy.

I know, DH. So mother complains we didn't help her!  My mother would request 1 of us to watch her and help her on the side, with making certain dishes. That is how I and rest of siblings learned. But I never made a complete cooked Chinese dinner   on my own, until I left home. Alot of the dishes we had/she showed are easy to cook. I cook alot of these dishes when I left home.  Some of the dishes are comfort food for me.

I started learning how to cut meat with large sharp knife when I was around 13 yrs. 

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