Introduction Why Should You Cook It’s easy to open a can of soup Making macaroni and cheese from a box is a cinch And you’ll have dinner on the table in no time if you buy a frozen lasagna and heat it in the microwave But if you make that soup from scratch or the mac and cheese or the lasagna it’s a lot more work So why should you make food from scratch There are plenty of reasons to cook for yourself To start cooking can be fun Turning raw ingredients into a delicious meal is an art It’s like painting a picture or writing a story or composing a song Once you get the hang of it cooking becomes easier and easier and the food you make will become tastier and tastier Food can be fascinating too There are all sorts of incredible things that happen to food when we prepare it like chemical reactions and transitions from one state to another such as when we turn cream into ice cream We even use little critters like bacteria and yeast to transform what nature has given us into the stuff we put in our mouths There’s more When you cook you are figuring out how to look after yourself and the people you care about Knowing how to cook makes you independent It’s part of growing up And cooking is bigger than simply making dinner Preparing food is a kind of language And that means that when you make a meal for people you are communicating with them You’re telling them a story about who you are and what you like to eat In the end when you cook something tasty it not only makes people happy but also makes you feel good It feels terrific to hear someone else say This is delicious And when you take a bite you can enjoy the food too 55
