Did your fathers cook a lot while you were growing up?
August 9, 2025
I don't hear too mamy stories of boys being in the kitchen with their fathers learning their recipes. Have any of yall done that growing up? Share some stories.
46 comments
Yes, in my family, the men did all the cooking. My grandmother was not much of a cook. My mother not much of a cook. My wife burnt water. If you want to stand out with a practical skill, cooking is excellent.
Yes! My dad worked in a kitchen when he first came to America. Both my parents cook but my dad taught us to EAT. My whole family is full of great cooks (I left corporate to open a cafe shop- I do cook back of house).
I make dinner most nights at home and I’m just way faster at making things on the spot. But totally, we had dad influence in our ability to cook and grill, properly.
No. My dad had a couple of recipes he did, but he was away most of the time and not particularly big into cooking when he was home. I vaguely remember what stuff he cooked, but I don’t know the recipes offhand and while I recently took photos of my family’s recipe folder, I don’t particularly care to look them up. I don’t feel any attachment to any of the food my family made.
Only if it was something that was cooked on the grill in the summer.
Or pumpkin pie.
Only things I ever remember him making growing up.
My father handled i think one meal in the house, and always took care of the grilling. Decades later, I do all the cooking except Thanksgiving and Christmas, but I’m helping with those.
You can be better than your upbringing. And guys: DIY doesn’t end at the kitchen door, cooking is fun too.
Nobody in my family cooked. Cooking is one skill I want to learn. I make some mean spaghetti and grill quite a bit, but I really want to get into cooking more extensive things.
That being said, I don’t have the patience for cooking. lol
No. He is still completely helpless in a domestic capacity. When he moved out of his parents house he lived in a motel to avoid domestic duties. If left to his own devices he would have McDonald’s three or four times a day, shaken up with BK or Arby’s. My sister takes care of him now that mom is gone, and if she is out of town, he expects me to drive across the entire metro to bring him dinner instead of getting a premade sandwich out of the fridge twenty feet and a corner away.
Yep. Every night. I do the same for my family now.
My dad is a hazard when baking things, but a decent cook. Plenty of other men were even better cooks and bakers so the holidays were a strong mix of men and women in the kitchen.
Mine burned water to convince my mom she was better off doing it.
My father did all the cooking. And when I’m home I do all the cooking.
My mom cooked most of the time (she liked feeding us) but it was the same 2-3 meals. My Dad cooked sometimes or sometimes just for himself because he was better at it but my mom preferred her food bland. I took after my father when it comes to cooking.
My dad’s only recipe was fried baloney.
My granddad (Neapolitan) cooked all the time, and my dad grilled. For my sons, they got me (M59) doing both growing up…still do!
Yes. The Greek diaspora doesn’t fuck around with food
My father cooked all the time, so did my mum. They both still do 😊 love their food.
Dad did grilling, some broiling, never was much for doing anything else. Would it have been nice to have had more, sure. But it was enough.
My father did most of the cooking when I was growing up.
My father had as about as much idea of cooking as a tea bag did of the history of the East India Company
My dad’s a really good cook when it comes down to it, but he doesn’t cook often. My mom didn’t cook all that much either. Most of my meals came out of a box or bag growing up, which was fine.
I can cook but I’m horribly inefficient at it. Gotta follow a recipe, leftovers or ingredients that should stretch to other things often spoil and go in the trash… but I can make something tasty if tasked with it.
My father tended to cook a big weekend breakfast every week, but that was basically it. He generally wasn’t home from work early enough to make dinner.
My dad didn’t cook. He wasn’t very good on the grill either.
I learned to cook with my grandmother and sister, and I learned to grill while in the military.
I cook lots these days. My wife does more, but I enjoy it.
I think I may have seen my father cook three times in my entire life. It was usually breakfast, or a BLT sandwich. Aside from that, he expected the woman of the house to cook and serve his meals. Not the greatest father, you’re probably not surprised to hear.
I’ve taken up cooking in my later years and I cook for my (mostly grown) sons when they visit. I cook a huge meal on Christmas morning. I also grill steaks or sausages, and I’ve started making spaghetti and tacos more recently. Fun times with my boys.
Very little, but he had a couple staples that for some reason were always his thing – shish kabobs with this marinade that I have no clue where he learned but was always great, and when my mom was teaching evenings part time he’d always make pizzas with us using those premade Boboli brand pizza doughs
Mine did all the outdoor cooking and anytime we had breakfast for dinner.
No, it’s a running joke with my kids that if grandma dies first, pop will go soon after of starvation.
My old man used to make us kids breakfast before school, as my mum started work early at 6am, but other than breakfasts, the only time I can recall by dad cooking was for a week when my mum was overseas for work when I was about 12 years old. Pretty sure we had steak sandwiches that week.
I’m not a chef by any means, but I do the majority of the actual cooking in our house, like making bolognese, meatballs, steaks, sausages, simple curries, etc., with my wife tending to do more of getting the kids food ready by cutting up and heating things already in the fridge.
No, not at all. My father claimed that he knew one recipe (carrot patties) and he made that one time for us.
My mother was not very creative in the kitchen, she could only follow recipes. But cooked quite well and was curious to try new things.
I ended up becoming a chef and owning my own restaurant however.
Yep. My dad was a milkman (showing my age?) so he was at work when we woke up and home when we got out of school and did most of the cooking. He was pretty good too.
It was very much preferred as back then mum wasn’t a great cook (she got much better through the years though).
Yes, dad was a chef.
Didn’t learn any of his or my mom’s recipes.
I’m the primary home cook. My food is delicious.
My dad is a chef lol so no.
Almost never when I was really young and then totally never as I got older. My mom worked second shift when I was young. She usually left us something to heat up. On rare occasions, my dad would make us TV dinners.
My dad was a short order cook at Howard Johnson’s for a short time in 1967/68. He made breakfasts and grilled for our family for the rest of his life.
I learned a lot of basic kitchen techniques and skills from him, but a limited repertoire.
I’ve seem my dad cook only a handful of times, and it was only for simple things. My mom was a serious cook, and she taught all her kids the basics. My brother and I enjoy cooking and do for most of the days. Both of our wives can’t and won’t cook. I always try to get my kids involved when i smoke things backyard, but they just aren’t interested
Frequently. He made breakfast and lunch on the weekends while my mom cooked during the week. My dad could make a good meal out of anything, and I picked that skill up from him. Mom was the “chef” where as he was more of a utility cook.
Growing up my dad would cook a few things. He would make the worst grilled food, always burnt. However in his older years has become quite a good cook and baker, still sucks at the grill though.
My Dad was the cook of the family and his mom and dad were both cookers.
Yeah my dad was a huge cook. Way better than my mom. I also cook but my wife prefers to eat her national cuisine which I have little experience in.
My dad owned a restaurant but never cooked either at the restaurant nor at home. Actually, the one meal I do recall him doing maybe once a year involved us going to Chinatown to get a dozen live blue crabs. We’d drive home and fill the bathtub with water and ice to keep them alive until dinner. Then he’d drop them into the steamer with boiling beer. Some of my happiest memories from childhood.
Sometimes he’d substitute crab with lobster.
Yes. He cooked almost all the meals for a long stretch. Having a father who isn’t sexist goes a long way
Not really, but kinda – my dad did pancakes on saturday mornings, that was a whole thing. Mickey mouse pancakes. And he cooked thanksgiving dishes – pies and stuff. But my mom cooked regular dinners.
My mom died of ovarian cancer when I was 15. Both of my sisters had gone off to college, so it was just me and my dad in the house. I was over at a friends house and his dad grilled steaks and it was amazing. I told my dad about it. He had a big grill put in our porch and started making that a thing – probably once a week to a couple of times a month, he’d get ribeyes and he’d grill onions and cook the steaks and we’d eat it with a piece of stilton. If I think about the dot com bust, I can remember sitting at the table and my dad trying to explain to me exactly what it was that was going on. And sometimes when I’m grilling onions with garlic in butter, that smell hits exactly right to take me back to that place.
If I’m cooking a steak, i’m still going to sautee onions and get a piece of some kind of bleu cheese. I’ll do asparagus and whatever else now, but that’s the meal for me. Pre-wife when Game of Thrones was first airing, it was a reverse sear on a ribeye with onions and bleu cheese and texas toast ready to go right in time for the theme song. My old boxer (RIP) staring at me from his bed waiting for me to throw him the fatty pieces.
I didn’t grow up with a father let alone several of them, so no, no time with him/them in the kitchen. My primary focus with my son is nutrition and satiety, whole foods, simple meals well-prepared. And to never cook expecting someone else to clean up your mess (how much easier clean up is when you clean as you go).
For the standard day to day cooking it was mom because she was a SAH mom but Dad had his things that cooked because he was better at it. I’m in Hawai’i and we catered (not professionally) a lot of parties and in that respect Dad did most of the mains and Mom did most of the sides and pupus. I ended up going to Culinary School and cooking professionally for about 20 years.
Yes – but made a big song and dance about it and would regularly kick off that we were all ungrateful and didn’t appreciate him, regardless of profusely we said thank you
My father can’t cook at all, but I spent a lot time with my mother cooking so now I can cook very well and am planning to teach my son how to do it
My dad taught me how to grill, how to make eggs and of course the greatest grilled cheese sandwich on earth. My mom was also an inspirational cook. It gave me a love and passion for cooking which only grows the older I get.
When my father was still alive him and my mom cooked together. But he was gone before I was really old enough to cook so I grew up cooking with my mom.
Now I do all of the cooking at home and my daughter helps me, my son as well but he’s pretty small. I plan to keep that alive so they can cook well on their own too – both of them. Food is a universal language of love.
46 comments
Yes, in my family, the men did all the cooking. My grandmother was not much of a cook. My mother not much of a cook. My wife burnt water. If you want to stand out with a practical skill, cooking is excellent.
Yes! My dad worked in a kitchen when he first came to America. Both my parents cook but my dad taught us to EAT. My whole family is full of great cooks (I left corporate to open a cafe shop- I do cook back of house).
I make dinner most nights at home and I’m just way faster at making things on the spot. But totally, we had dad influence in our ability to cook and grill, properly.
No. My dad had a couple of recipes he did, but he was away most of the time and not particularly big into cooking when he was home. I vaguely remember what stuff he cooked, but I don’t know the recipes offhand and while I recently took photos of my family’s recipe folder, I don’t particularly care to look them up. I don’t feel any attachment to any of the food my family made.
Only if it was something that was cooked on the grill in the summer.
Or pumpkin pie.
Only things I ever remember him making growing up.
My father handled i think one meal in the house, and always took care of the grilling. Decades later, I do all the cooking except Thanksgiving and Christmas, but I’m helping with those.
You can be better than your upbringing. And guys: DIY doesn’t end at the kitchen door, cooking is fun too.
Nobody in my family cooked. Cooking is one skill I want to learn. I make some mean spaghetti and grill quite a bit, but I really want to get into cooking more extensive things.
That being said, I don’t have the patience for cooking. lol
No. He is still completely helpless in a domestic capacity. When he moved out of his parents house he lived in a motel to avoid domestic duties. If left to his own devices he would have McDonald’s three or four times a day, shaken up with BK or Arby’s. My sister takes care of him now that mom is gone, and if she is out of town, he expects me to drive across the entire metro to bring him dinner instead of getting a premade sandwich out of the fridge twenty feet and a corner away.
Yep. Every night. I do the same for my family now.
My dad is a hazard when baking things, but a decent cook. Plenty of other men were even better cooks and bakers so the holidays were a strong mix of men and women in the kitchen.
Mine burned water to convince my mom she was better off doing it.
My father did all the cooking. And when I’m home I do all the cooking.
My mom cooked most of the time (she liked feeding us) but it was the same 2-3 meals. My Dad cooked sometimes or sometimes just for himself because he was better at it but my mom preferred her food bland. I took after my father when it comes to cooking.
My dad’s only recipe was fried baloney.
My granddad (Neapolitan) cooked all the time, and my dad grilled. For my sons, they got me (M59) doing both growing up…still do!
Yes. The Greek diaspora doesn’t fuck around with food
My father cooked all the time, so did my mum. They both still do 😊 love their food.
Dad did grilling, some broiling, never was much for doing anything else. Would it have been nice to have had more, sure. But it was enough.
My father did most of the cooking when I was growing up.
My father had as about as much idea of cooking as a tea bag did of the history of the East India Company
My dad’s a really good cook when it comes down to it, but he doesn’t cook often. My mom didn’t cook all that much either. Most of my meals came out of a box or bag growing up, which was fine.
I can cook but I’m horribly inefficient at it. Gotta follow a recipe, leftovers or ingredients that should stretch to other things often spoil and go in the trash… but I can make something tasty if tasked with it.
My father tended to cook a big weekend breakfast every week, but that was basically it. He generally wasn’t home from work early enough to make dinner.
My dad didn’t cook. He wasn’t very good on the grill either.
I learned to cook with my grandmother and sister, and I learned to grill while in the military.
I cook lots these days. My wife does more, but I enjoy it.
I think I may have seen my father cook three times in my entire life. It was usually breakfast, or a BLT sandwich. Aside from that, he expected the woman of the house to cook and serve his meals. Not the greatest father, you’re probably not surprised to hear.
I’ve taken up cooking in my later years and I cook for my (mostly grown) sons when they visit. I cook a huge meal on Christmas morning. I also grill steaks or sausages, and I’ve started making spaghetti and tacos more recently. Fun times with my boys.
Very little, but he had a couple staples that for some reason were always his thing – shish kabobs with this marinade that I have no clue where he learned but was always great, and when my mom was teaching evenings part time he’d always make pizzas with us using those premade Boboli brand pizza doughs
Mine did all the outdoor cooking and anytime we had breakfast for dinner.
No, it’s a running joke with my kids that if grandma dies first, pop will go soon after of starvation.
My old man used to make us kids breakfast before school, as my mum started work early at 6am, but other than breakfasts, the only time I can recall by dad cooking was for a week when my mum was overseas for work when I was about 12 years old. Pretty sure we had steak sandwiches that week.
I’m not a chef by any means, but I do the majority of the actual cooking in our house, like making bolognese, meatballs, steaks, sausages, simple curries, etc., with my wife tending to do more of getting the kids food ready by cutting up and heating things already in the fridge.
No, not at all. My father claimed that he knew one recipe (carrot patties) and he made that one time for us.
My mother was not very creative in the kitchen, she could only follow recipes. But cooked quite well and was curious to try new things.
I ended up becoming a chef and owning my own restaurant however.
Yep. My dad was a milkman (showing my age?) so he was at work when we woke up and home when we got out of school and did most of the cooking. He was pretty good too.
It was very much preferred as back then mum wasn’t a great cook (she got much better through the years though).
Yes, dad was a chef.
Didn’t learn any of his or my mom’s recipes.
I’m the primary home cook. My food is delicious.
My dad is a chef lol so no.
Almost never when I was really young and then totally never as I got older. My mom worked second shift when I was young. She usually left us something to heat up. On rare occasions, my dad would make us TV dinners.
My dad was a short order cook at Howard Johnson’s for a short time in 1967/68. He made breakfasts and grilled for our family for the rest of his life.
I learned a lot of basic kitchen techniques and skills from him, but a limited repertoire.
I’ve seem my dad cook only a handful of times, and it was only for simple things. My mom was a serious cook, and she taught all her kids the basics. My brother and I enjoy cooking and do for most of the days. Both of our wives can’t and won’t cook. I always try to get my kids involved when i smoke things backyard, but they just aren’t interested
Frequently. He made breakfast and lunch on the weekends while my mom cooked during the week. My dad could make a good meal out of anything, and I picked that skill up from him. Mom was the “chef” where as he was more of a utility cook.
Growing up my dad would cook a few things. He would make the worst grilled food, always burnt. However in his older years has become quite a good cook and baker, still sucks at the grill though.
My Dad was the cook of the family and his mom and dad were both cookers.
Yeah my dad was a huge cook. Way better than my mom. I also cook but my wife prefers to eat her national cuisine which I have little experience in.
My dad owned a restaurant but never cooked either at the restaurant nor at home. Actually, the one meal I do recall him doing maybe once a year involved us going to Chinatown to get a dozen live blue crabs. We’d drive home and fill the bathtub with water and ice to keep them alive until dinner. Then he’d drop them into the steamer with boiling beer. Some of my happiest memories from childhood.
Sometimes he’d substitute crab with lobster.
Yes. He cooked almost all the meals for a long stretch. Having a father who isn’t sexist goes a long way
Not really, but kinda – my dad did pancakes on saturday mornings, that was a whole thing. Mickey mouse pancakes. And he cooked thanksgiving dishes – pies and stuff. But my mom cooked regular dinners.
My mom died of ovarian cancer when I was 15. Both of my sisters had gone off to college, so it was just me and my dad in the house. I was over at a friends house and his dad grilled steaks and it was amazing. I told my dad about it. He had a big grill put in our porch and started making that a thing – probably once a week to a couple of times a month, he’d get ribeyes and he’d grill onions and cook the steaks and we’d eat it with a piece of stilton. If I think about the dot com bust, I can remember sitting at the table and my dad trying to explain to me exactly what it was that was going on. And sometimes when I’m grilling onions with garlic in butter, that smell hits exactly right to take me back to that place.
If I’m cooking a steak, i’m still going to sautee onions and get a piece of some kind of bleu cheese. I’ll do asparagus and whatever else now, but that’s the meal for me. Pre-wife when Game of Thrones was first airing, it was a reverse sear on a ribeye with onions and bleu cheese and texas toast ready to go right in time for the theme song. My old boxer (RIP) staring at me from his bed waiting for me to throw him the fatty pieces.
I didn’t grow up with a father let alone several of them, so no, no time with him/them in the kitchen. My primary focus with my son is nutrition and satiety, whole foods, simple meals well-prepared. And to never cook expecting someone else to clean up your mess (how much easier clean up is when you clean as you go).
For the standard day to day cooking it was mom because she was a SAH mom but Dad had his things that cooked because he was better at it. I’m in Hawai’i and we catered (not professionally) a lot of parties and in that respect Dad did most of the mains and Mom did most of the sides and pupus. I ended up going to Culinary School and cooking professionally for about 20 years.
Yes – but made a big song and dance about it and would regularly kick off that we were all ungrateful and didn’t appreciate him, regardless of profusely we said thank you
My father can’t cook at all, but I spent a lot time with my mother cooking so now I can cook very well and am planning to teach my son how to do it
My dad taught me how to grill, how to make eggs and of course the greatest grilled cheese sandwich on earth. My mom was also an inspirational cook. It gave me a love and passion for cooking which only grows the older I get.
When my father was still alive him and my mom cooked together. But he was gone before I was really old enough to cook so I grew up cooking with my mom.
Now I do all of the cooking at home and my daughter helps me, my son as well but he’s pretty small. I plan to keep that alive so they can cook well on their own too – both of them. Food is a universal language of love.