When I date, one of my most common date plans (once I’m close with the person) is to do something cool, then invite them to my house to eat dinner. My first invitation is always with me planning to cook for the girl. Usually, this leads to them offering to help me cook whatever the dish is because they want to feel involved in the process. Most of the girls I’ve dated also have little to no clue how to cook anything more complicated than pre-packaged stuff. The first time I tried to let one girl help, I had to teach her how to use a knife. When I started out letting my dates help, it was hard for me to know how to balance letting them be slow versus getting the food prepared in time to mix things correctly. This was especially difficult for one of my favorite chicken dishes, since the timing to make sure the chicken keeps its texture is very important. After some near-misses, I have now learned that the best way to handle this is to let my “assistant” handle all of the preparation that can be handled before a flame is ever lit.

My current girlfriend also doesn’t have much experience cooking, since she’s lived with her parents her entire life. But she really likes feeling helpful, so my trick is to ask her to cut things and then wash the dishes after. I make her feel involved in the cooking process by talking about what I’m doing as I’m doing it. It’s not real teaching, but I give her random bits of information she didn’t know before. Like the fact that hot water can be used to easily clean oil and butter off of things. I also let her choose between a couple of ingredients for some of the less specific dishes. Most recently, I let her pick how we flavored our rice, and I suggested using a basil Genovese sauce. The concept was so novel that she picked it, and I made the additions necessary to make it to match our tastes afterward. It turned out excellently, and it helped us both have fun while cooking. The only reason I could do this was that I had already experimented with all of the ingredients in my house. I knew what worked and didn’t. For anyone who plans to cook with somebody else, I would suggest a similar tactic to add a sort of whimsy to the cooking even though it’s already prepared in your mind. Feel free to get back to me on how this works out!