Back to school means so many things after the long summer break. Digging out uniforms to discover polo shirts are now embarrassingly short… the daily challenge of making school lunches.. and having to get out of bed at a (quite frankly, shockingly) early hour, after a glorious few weeks of lazy lie-ins. 

With both my kids now at Intermediate School and College, school also brings with it a new bounty of options. At the end of last term, they brought home detailed lists of possible subject choices for the coming year. Obviously the core subjects remain (no escaping English, Maths, Science, PE etc) but they have the privilege of selecting other options. These include Graphic Design, Languages, Business Studies… and Food Technology. My daughter, bless her, was quite put out to discover that Food Tech was not an option for lowly Year 8’s. Like her mum, she’s quite at home in the kitchen. She’ll come home from school and happily make herself afternoon tea – perhaps a toasted sandwich or milkshake – and loves to help out with cooking dinner. She often flips open my battered Edmonds Cookery Book to whip up a batch of Afghans from start to finish, with zero help from me.

My son, however is a different story. He’s as familiar with our kitchen as a dog is with long division. The only exception being the truly staggering mountain of cereals that he consumes each week. (He’s a very sporty boy and can seemingly eat his entire body weight in puffed wheat and corn flakes without getting full). He manages to take the milk from the fridge, and find a bowl and spoon without any issue. Imagine!

When my kids were young, we loved baking together. One of our most memorable school holiday activities was building a gingerbread house with stained glass windows from scratch (all freehand). It took an entire day to make (far less time to eat!).

These days though, his kitchen activity really does centre around eating cereal, and washing up. So imagine my surprise to find that not only had he opted to study Food Technology the previous year at school – but wanted to do it again this year! Food Tech! Essentially cooking, recipes, baking….

So, a daughter who LOVES to cook, and can’t study it at school (yet). And a son who apparently doesn’t like cooking at home but LOVES to do it at school! Go figure.

Perhaps one day there’ll be a One Handed Baker Junior page spring up…