by Joan Inong

Created on: December 23, 2008

Cooking is an underrated art that has, over the years, lost its value in the world. Recipes that have been passed down from generation to generation have been stashed away in recipe boxes, unused and probably collecting dust. An art that once brought families and friends together is now specially reserved for those who have the passion and the time to do it.

I learned to bake and cook six years ago, and I really don't know what led me to learn. Perhaps it was because I loved food and it was a form of art that one could eat. For whatever reason I wanted to learn how to cook, now I am quite glad that I did. As a college student, I believe that cooking is an essential skill. Cooking does not have to be art, per se, since amateurs can whip up amazingly great-tasting food without the knowledge of fancy French terms. Yet, even if cooking is a skill, it does not require one to be naturally talented. There are plenty of chefs out there who learn how to cook like they do; they weren't naturally born to do it.

Perhaps one of the biggest reasons why cooking has lost its place in the family is because modern age demands other responsibilities: mothers who once had to stay home because they were forced to and because they had nowhere else to go now have full-time jobs and children, while daughters who once learned how to cook from their grandmothers now live hundreds if not thousands of miles away from them.

I know very few people who know how to cook, even if it means making a simple cookie recipe from a box. I remember chuckling softly when one of my college friends remarked, "I really want to cook, but I don't know how" after having seen me bake a pound cake from scratch. I didn't feel any more superior towards her, and neither did I feel pity or sympathy; instead, I wondered why she hadn't naturally verged towards learning how to cook. I realized, of course, that not all people wonder if they can replicate Paula Deen's recipes from the Food Network. I, on the other hand, was lucky enough to be inclined towards wanting to replicate those recipes.

Learning how to cook is a little based on culture, yet I grew up in the United States and I grew with my culture rather than denied it. I saw others who were similar to my position who neither knew how to bake nor cook at all. Suddenly I knew that cooking is very much like an art: not just because it resulted in beautiful things, but also because it is not meant for everyone. If everyone could cook equally well and wanted to cook all the time, there would be no need for restaurants.

Of course, if I have a daughter, I would emphasize the essential skill of knowing how to cook well. It is not enough that we can go a few blocks to the nearest fast-food restaurant and get a whole meal that someone put together quickly enough in the space of minutes. To me, it is more important that we learn how to make things together, to share and spend quality time that would give us memories for the future.

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