We're in an obesity epidemic and most people don't know how to cook even very basic meals.
Make space for it, squish other classes if you need. Make it mandatory, everyone has to take it. Maybe even ongoing through multiple grades.
Edit: Rice, beans, and even basic meats are cheap. To eat healthy you don't need your meal to be 100% Bell peppers and tomatoes.
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Yes force to cook, that’s whole point, To teach how to cook.
To eat? Well if you can’t eat your own cooking that’s your own pass or fail. (Obviously you shouldn’t force vegetarians to eat meat or muslims to eat pork.)
People can’t even start if they don’t know how to cook.
You can say that about any subject. That’s the point of having schools and mandatory learning, to teach the essentials that are not negotiable. And what I’m saying in this post is that we should have cooking as mandatory as any other subject in school because it’s an essential life skill. Not negotiable, not outsourced to parents, you get it in school.