How old is your son?

You might want to get him an age specific "beginner's guide to cooking."

How old is he and what are his favourite foods? That is the place to start.

My son is a great cook, but I never set out to teach him. Just the fact that I liked to cook and eat and foods were talked about a lot in our house he seemed to absorb a lot. And he was introduced to so many different foods (ethnic) as well.

If we know what he likes it will be easier to make suggestions.

Ann

Having a lesson in shopping for food might be a good idea too! Could be one less guy in the future standing in the aisle with that deer-in-the-headlight look! LOL!

I agree, it depends on the age of the son. My girls both spent time in the kitchen with me throughout their childhoods, cooking whatever I cooked. They chopped vegetables and kneaded bread and beat buttercream and whisked the pancake batter.

Now my grandkids bake cookies with me, and Makayla (age 7) can whip up her "speciality", pumpkin waffles, with little or no help from me. Bud is 5, he's still working on the rice krispie treats, LOL.

So, how old is he and what does he like? Makayla likes to make her own pizza and I bought her a bread machine at GoodWill, so now she's working on homemade crust. She also likes macaroni and cheese, so that's another thing we make.

Let him make what he likes and he'll enjoy cooking more, I think. My girls went everywhere with me, from the grocery store to the local mexican joint, so they got exposed to a lot of food and food "stuff". They helped me in the garden, gathered eggs, picked blueberries. I think that makes a difference too.

Annie

And make a big fuss when he does cook something. If we kids so much as stirred a pot of something mom was cooking (because she asked us to) then: Kyle "made" the... whatever it was. She'd announce that at the table like we really had soemthing to do with it lol. But I have to say her doing so did spur the boys on to cooking and enjoying good food. My sister, however, cooked like Elly May Clampett until she was well past age 40.

This might help you both. Teresa's idea of teaching him how to shop is a GREAT one!

Here is a link that might be useful: Five ingredients or less

Problem is a lot of my easy recipes can have 5 or more different seasonings! The number of ingredients doesn't make something easy or difficult in my opinion. I think ribs (especially country style) may look difficult but are easy to make and a turkey breast is also easy, but it makes for a real feeling of satisfaction when you make it, don't overcook it and find that it's not that difficult. OTOH, some things like cooking rice can be easy to ruin.

Without knowing age, likes and dislikes it's impossible to give recipes but I can give suggestions and that is to concentrate more on techniques than hard and fast recipes. In a tater tot hotdish for example, instead of a given amount of ground beef, it can be chicken, turkey, pork, ham or otherwise. Doesn't *have* to be tater tots, could be fresh potatoes or any number of frozen or canned ones. Veg can be your choice, in it or on the side. Cream soup is convenient but you can use other alternatives for health or taste desires.

Cooking for a beginner can be so simple. And really should start with some of the basics. How to boil water sounds simple but it's a basic. Simple pasta dishes are great learning ideas. And even knowing how to heat up something from a can, doctor it up (can/jar spaghetti sauce can be made quite tasty) and food safety, sanitation and the like are basics that are so often overlooked. How to use a meat thermometer. And so on.

Some things that are simple in theory can be difficult for some. It took me a long time to get the knack of boiling potatoes without overcooking at least some of them. So I wound up with box flakes for too long.

And like I mentioned, adjusting recipes to your likes is a basic thing but not always obvious. My old GF wanted a no-boil lasagna recipe. I don't use a recipe per se for my lasagna but she couldn't understand a guideline - it had to be a written recipe. So I found one for a spinach lasagna that gave the technique in writing and easy enough for her to follow. She refused to try it. "I DON'T LIKE SPINACH!!!!!" And of course "THEN LEAVE IT OUT!!!!" went over like the Hindenburg... Till the day she died, I was unable to get through to her that recipes are guidelines, not rules.

My last suggestion is consider your definition of cooking. Warming up a can of soup can be cooking, and an accomplishment to someone who has never done it before. Embellishing it is another type of cooking. You don't have to raise the meat, grow the veggies and make your stock all the time. Start slow (baby steps it's often called) and work up. Nothing wrong with shortcuts, especially for a beginner.