What age to allow/teach kids to stove top cook?

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  • k8eekins
    k8eekins Posts: 2,264 Member
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    My son will be 9 in June. He loves to be independant and make his own food. What age did you parents start allowing your kids to heat things like soup or a grilled cheese on the stove? (supervised of course)

    :happy: What a blessing you have there@ independent son who enjoys cooking!

    As a legal guardian and with my God Children, I'd first introduced them to making salads whilst they were still toddlers (surely after their potty-training stages), so that'll be around the ages of 4 and 5, after they'd thoroughly washed their hands (whilst singing the Lord's Prayer or Happy birthday to me ~ themselves that is); At the ages of 6 - 8 was when I'd introduced them to doing chunk cuts (with vegetables and fruits, olives mainly), making sandwiches (mostly regular) and then soon after, soups and stews, baking (quiches/pies/cakes/breads/buns), pasta salads/bakes, roasts (vegetables only) and mini-grilling which I'd introduced to them well before they'd turned 11. *They'd had the use of the veggie-cutting (manual) gadgets, all without the use of a knife ~ which sat comfortably with me at the time. I'd also gotten them to look through picture cookbooks where they'd select what they'd wanted to try, which I'd use to my advantage for colour/counting/word building/shapes and textures exercises before I'd advance them with what I'd use as a library excursion exercise ~ basic use of the library (research skill) to find out as much as they could about their select ingredient within a set duration.

    Kitchen safety plus health & hygiene awareness aside, an encouraging environment with the general ambiance (accommodating) allowing them to familiarise themselves with food (cuisines), as they develop physically, intellectually building up on their language base(s), whilst furthering their emotional layers & maturity with the forms of interactive learning forced through the kitchen base within their family homes~ allows them to become positively socialised and adept.

    *I'd specialised in Child Care & Development as part of my Finishing School Curriculum so I didn't exactly go about it as I probably should've done with the children; Executed and delegated ~ without leaving any room for options ~ just activity filled and project oriented, with the fun base in good company, whilst they were on my watch.
  • DalekBrittany
    DalekBrittany Posts: 1,748 Member
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    I was "helping" by 4 and was allowed to cook by myself unsupervised by 10. It really isn't an age thing, I think, it's more of a maturity thing. If your kid is 12 but he's irresponsible and likely to do something stupid while they're alone then maybe they should still be supervised. I don't think my mom feels comfortable with my little brother cooking on his own now...and he's 19.

    Of course, he's likely to do something dumb, like the time when he was 15 and took a serrated bread knife and tried to sharpen it with the handheld sharpener...ask his middle, ring, and pinky fingers how that worked out!
  • jamiem1102
    jamiem1102 Posts: 1,196 Member
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    I would think 12 would be a safe age to allow kids to cook on the stove unsupervised. ...and maybe 8-10 with supervision. :)
  • coolraul07
    coolraul07 Posts: 1,606 Member
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    I was "helping" by 4 and was allowed to cook by myself unsupervised by 10. It really isn't an age thing, I think, it's more of a maturity thing. If your kid is 12 but he's irresponsible and likely to do something stupid while they're alone then maybe they should still be supervised.
    ...

    ^^THIS! You have to make a judgement call based on maturity and following directions! I was a latch-key at age 4, cooking unsupervised at age 5, allowed to ride the city bus across town solo (>1 hr) at age 6, and allowed to stay at home all day (e.g. >8 hours) by myself at age 7.
    I wasn't your typical kid. I grew up between 2 housing projects in a city that had a "nation's top 5" for per-capita homocide rate several years running. However, I was very risk-adverse when situations were properly explained to me. I avoided trouble like the plague, didn't invite kids over without permission, etc.
    It's a good thing that Internet wasn't around when I was growing up! It was bad enough when I was a teen and they accidentally unblocked Cinemax for a month before my Mom found out!
  • sizzle74
    sizzle74 Posts: 858 Member
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    Thanks for all the replies! I am loving these stories!
  • k8eekins
    k8eekins Posts: 2,264 Member
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    Coolraul:

    ^^THIS! You have to make a judgement call based on maturity and following directions! I was a latch-key at age 4, cooking unsupervised at age 5, allowed to ride the city bus across town solo (>1 hr) at age 6, and allowed to stay at home all day (e.g. >8 hours) by myself at age 7.
    I wasn't your typical kid. I grew up between 2 housing projects in a city that had a "nation's top 5" for per-capita homocide rate several years running. However, I was very risk-adverse when situations were properly explained to me. I avoided trouble like the plague, didn't invite kids over without permission, etc.
    It's a good thing that Internet wasn't around when I was growing up! It was bad enough when I was a teen and they accidentally unblocked Cinemax for a month before my Mom found out!

    I too was a momentary latch key child, as a toddler when I'd had to visit with my maternal grandparents, so I completely associate with how you knew your way about the kitchen as early as 5 ... My sister and I were always our Grandmother's 2ICs so breakfast was freshly made ~ beignets (and the like) ~ lunch was always about those one pot meal varieties with the essential freshly made breads or other side vegetable alternatives (rice/noodles/root vegetables), sometimes without supervision ~ enough to feed an entire village, so we'd always had to get up early for the fresh run to the grocers ~ unsupervised in the early hours of the morning ~ uphill, passing drunks and all forms of debris, knowing how to step, slide and sprint on command (ie reactive survival instinct).

    From one who'd also lived in the Projects (as a toddler/child) only from a different part of the world, I must commend you for comfortably sharing your facet of how you'd first gotten introduced ~ out of necessity.
  • taz69tazz
    taz69tazz Posts: 57
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    My daughter started cooking about at 8 yrs old she is now going on 12 and she makes like soup...mac n chz.. eggs .. french fries and my son cooks also ... i just showed them once or twice and there they went :drinker:
  • Timshel_
    Timshel_ Posts: 22,841 Member
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    They have to be tall enough to lift a pan of something off the stove without having their arms up above thier shoulders. Preferably no higher than chest level.
  • zyxst
    zyxst Posts: 9,134 Member
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    I was 8 and Mom got tired of constantly making me a completely different meal since I'm a picky eater. It was fried bologna.
  • jbbrannon
    jbbrannon Posts: 167 Member
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    9 or 10 supervised stovetop

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