Teaching teens to cook is a valuable skill they will use for the rest of their lives. When teens know how to cook, they can eat healthier and not rely on fast food and food delivery apps.
Our kids learned to cook at a young age. They spent a lot of time in the kitchen with us, learning to peel and chop vegetables. Measuring ingredients was another task they had while helping us to prepare meals. Now our youngest is 19, and he can cook a full meal for the family by himself, although no one in this house ever gets the kitchen to themselves.
Basic Recipes To Start
We started all our kids off with basic recipes when they were ready. Some of the simplest recipes are still our kids’ favourites.
For breakfast, scrambled eggs were the first thing we taught our kids. It is a simple recipe that takes only a few minutes, which makes it perfect for teens who always seem to be in a hurry.
For lunches, we taught our kids to make Tuna Melts. We have a great recipe for tuna melts on our other website that can be prepared in either a frying pan or on the outdoor griddle. These sandwiches are a step up from grilled cheese, and the kids love them.
When it comes to dinner, our kids learned to make one-dish meals first. Pasta dishes were one of the first meals they learned because of their simplicity. Eventually, they moved up to homemade mac and cheese.
They also learned to make burgers, which is one of their favourites. They even learned how to make the patties themselves instead of relying on us to make them.
Baking Recipes That Are Easy For Teens
Our daughters love to bake, and they are always baking something. They love to share cookies and sweet breads, or muffins, with their friends.
Cookies and muffins are probably the easiest recipes to try, as long as they are not complicated. Chocolate chip cookies were our daughters’ first cookie recipes, and now that they are older, they are creating their own cookie recipes. One of our daughters created her own Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe that is a family favourite.
Banana bread and other sweet breads are also great options to teach kids to make.
Another recipe that our teens loved to make is No-Knead Bread. At first, they were impatient because the recipe does take almost 24 hours from start to finish. But the results are worth it.
Easy BBQ Recipes For Teens
Our kids grew up with BBQ. They learned every kind of BBQ from charcoal to gas by the time they were teenagers. Not every kid is as lucky. But if you have a teen who wants to learn, there are simple recipes that are easy enough and can all be made using a gas grill or an outdoor griddle.
The one recipe our son keeps making and has been making since he was about 12, is BBQ Queso. He even prepares it for camping. It is an easy snack/appetizer that teens love.
Our son has learned to use the pellet smoker as well. It is the easiest type of smoker to use. His favourite recipe to make on the smoker is smoked bologna. This is another easy recipe to make that kids love.
Simple Recipes For Teenagers
These are just a few of the recipes our kids learned to make during their teenage years. They have also shared these recipes with their friends, who have had success with them as well.
- Pancakes. Teenagers usually love pancakes, so why not let them make them from scratch instead of a box?
- Chocolate Chip Cookies. Everyone loves a good chocolate chip cookie. This recipe has been in our family for years.
- Chocolate Chip Muffins. These muffins have been a family favourite for years. It is an easy-to-make recipe that can be adapted to use any type of chocolate chips or even fruit or berries.
Remember that teaching teenagers to cook is a skill they can use for the rest of their lives. Cooking encourages creativity and is a valuable skill to learn.
We hope you enjoy these recipes we shared today, and we would love to hear from you. Leave us a comment below to let us know what you think of the recipes and if there are other recipes you’d like to try. Feel free to ask us questions about these recipes or any of our other offerings.
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