Our first cooking experiences

Kikelomo Aliyu, 14 years old
My first cooking experience was bad. While growing, I never liked cooking because I found it stressful but my mum made it clear to me that as a female, I needed to learn how to cook in order to take care of my family when I marry. So I would watch her. I didn’t know I would be asked to prepare a meal not long after, but mum encouraged me. One night, she came back from her shop late and tired so she asked me to prepare dinner, Amala and  Ewedu, I was shocked. Cooking ewedu was not a big deal but the preparation of amala was the hard one. After pouring yam flour into boiling water, I did not know what to do for few minutes so by the time I remember mum used to stir it, it was late as it had a lot of lumps. The amala was supposed to come out fine but it happened not to because I had no  interest initially. She scolded me that night and since then, I have always given everything she cooks in the kitchen rapt attention.

Hannah Peter, 13 years old
As a little girl, I have always dreamt to cook but anytime I asked mum if I could cook, she  would say “tomorrow.” When tomorrow comes, she would say ‘tomorrow’ again. My chance came one early morning when she had to go to work urgently so she came to me and said “My dear, I think you should cook I thought I was dreaming at first. I quickly went to  kitchen, wore an apron, took fresh tomatoes and pepper and grounded it. I took an onion, peeled and started cutting it  but immediately I felt a sharp pain on my little finger; I had cut myself with the knife. I treated it immediately so that no  one would know or say I did not know how to cook. I lit the cooker, placed a pot on it and put oil, grounded pepper and  I  added seasoning and water then covered the pot. After a while, I added some spaghetti and covered the pot again.  When the food was done, I turned off the cooker and served. It was when I was putting the food on the dining table that  I remembered that I forgot to add salt.

Emmanuel Eguaoje, 13 years old
I am used to my brother cooking for me but on the day I cooked for the first time. He was busy washing the car. I went to  hurry him up that I wanted to eat and he told me to go and boil water. When the water boiled, I went back to tell him but my daddy told me to go and cook myself. I went inside and prepared eba. The eba was hard and still had garri that was  not properly mixed with water. I ate it with vegetable soup. Although the eba was not properly done yet I was  happy that I cooked it by myself.

Praise Akinpelu, 14 years oldMy first cooking experience was a great one because I had always stayed with my mummy in the kitchen, learning how to cook. One  day, my mummy had a seminar to attend so she could not wait to prepare a meal for us and my daddy  was  also not around. So being the eldest one at home I had to cook for my younger brother and me. At that  time, I was 10 years  old. I decided to cook rice and stew though I did not know how to go about it, but I summoned courage. When I served the meal, I discovered that the salt I added to rice was too little and it was not well  cooked while the Maggi cubes and salt in the stew were moderate but it was not well cooked as well. My mummy was  happy that I cooked and since then, she allowed I prepare meals till now.

Christiana Afreh, 17 years old
One bright morning, long ago, I woke up with excitement because mum had promised to cook my favourite meal. I ran to the  kitchen but could not find my mummy. I started crying and my sister came to ask why. When I told her the reason, she  burst out with laughter and told me mum had travelled and that she was going for Saturday lessons. So I should cook  noodles and eat if I liked it. Immediately she left, I decided to cook Banku and groundnut soup. I followed the  preparation steps and the food came out delicious. I left some for my sister and she also commended me that it was a  delicious meal. I told her of my experience but she found it hard to believe, but I told her about the pains I had from some  burns from the cooking process.

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