National Cooking Day is a day that was originally started by a company in an effort to sell more cookware. Nowadays, people celebrate it more as a way to take the time to cook at home. Cooking at home is a good way to control what you put in your body, but it can also help you save money and can also be a bonding experience.
At CHV, this day was an opportunity to teach some youth how to make omelettes. Two youth from the Crisis Program and two from Rights of Passage program (ROP) participated that day.
The session took place in the teaching kitchen that is located in the renovated ROP building. This kitchen has five work stations (one in the middle for demonstrations and four surrounding stations). Each station comes complete with cookware and utensils.
The session started with a lesson in proper handwashing. Using an agent that reacted to blacklight, youth experienced, firsthand, how to make sure their hands were clean.
Before any cooking took place youth were introduced to the three different types of knives that were at each station, as well as how to safely use each knife. The young people were taught techniques such as chopping, dicing, and julienne. Once the youth were comfortable with knife handling, they each got to practice by preparing the fillings that they had chosen for their omelettes.
Youth were taught to make two styles of omelettes — the American (folded) and the French (rolled). They were also taught the one-handed egg crack.
The life skills coordinator who taught the session chose omelettes for a number of reasons:
- Omelettes are a way to make a filling meal using only a few ingredients
- As a way to show the versatility of eggs
- Eggs are high in protein
- Breakfast meals tend to be cheaper to make
- Some youth don’t eat three meals a day, but have a day meal and an evening meal. Omelettes are a good way to get the nutrients you need, during the day
A couple of the youth had never cooked before or had never cooked with eggs before. All were very pleased with their results. One youth commented, “This was the best meal that I’ve ever made for myself.”
Bon appétit!