Such a long time ago! I can't remember. I do vaguely remember that the first real foray any of us kids were allowed to make into the kitchen (ruled by my father) was for wontons. My dad would mix up a huge batch of filling and he and my mother would teach us how to fold them. To this day, the smell of raw wonton filling takes me back...

I always helped in the kitchen growing up. My brother's (now ex-) stepmother taught me to make baked potatoes when I was eight.
The first complete meal I ever made alone was breakfast! Biscuits and sausage gravy, scrambled eggs and bacon. It's still one of my favorite meals (eggs are over easy these days) and I get raves on the gravy any time I make it.

the first real meal i've prepared (besides like lame stuff i made through university) was a couple weeks ago - baked penne with chicken and tomatoes

I always helped in the kitchen, but I remember the very first time I was in charge of the meal - I was 8 my parents had bought me the "Kids in the Kitchen" cook book and I made a meatloaf that you baked inside a loaf of sourdough bread - in my eyes the best thing ever!!

Mine was "real" mac & cheese, not out of a box. The problem was, I forgot to cook the noodles first, just assuming that they would soften up and cook themselves in the oven. Well, needless to say they didn't, and my family enjoyed crunchy mac and cheese for dinner that night. Luckily, they were very nice about it and everyone actually ate their share, but I STILL haven't heard the end of it

Well, I have a sister that was a carnivore and a bully growing up. She had me making her carne asada and eggs by the time I was 7 as she babysat me. In retrospect I am grateful for her tough love. I whipped up my first full Thanksgiving for my family when I was 9.

When I was young I used to make the scrambled eggs. They were great, and the recipe was a secret, my older cousins still occasionally mention it when we are together and cooking.

I don't remember...I always used to help my mom in the kitchen with dinner.

My first dish was chili, thanks to you Party!

When I was a kid, my Dad and I would get up early every Sunday morning and make omelettes together...and sometimes we'd try to make a happy face with the cheese, even though it was always a futile attempt. It was the favorite part of my weekends!

Pancakes!

Probably cheese pie. Yum!

Who knows...I've been cooking all my life. It was probably something simple like tacos or spaghetti with meat sauce.

No clue, I've been cooking for so long. It was just something that had to be done... not a monumental event.

I can't remember.

well i know that i had to cook for myself a lot when i was younger because my mom worked a lot of jobs, but i'm guessing that it was a hot dog concoction of some sort.

once i got to college though, the first 'adult' meal that i ever cooked was a chicken alfredo type dish. it was interesting to say the least. i've definitely come a long way

I think the very first thing I learned to make were omelets, probably the first meal was pasta with meat sauce. Easy stuff.

Do frozen fish sticks count? My mother was not much of a cook. In fact, I have not had those delicious sticks, Kraft mac and cheese or her gourmet special, tuna casserole (Friday nights), since I left home.

I took HomeEc in the 7th grade and remember being super excited to make pizza...with a bisquick crust. The first meal I cooked for my family was tacos...I must have been around 11-12yo.

Ha. I distinctly remember being very young, using my 'kids cookbook' and attempting an apple pie. let's just say it was a bit monstrous. But the apples were tasty!

I guess my first real dish was a dessert called "puppy chow." It's so easy to make, but I needed a "demonstration" speech for my speech class in H.S. and decided I'd cook and demonstrate a recipe. It went really well and it's very yummy. (I made it last week because i was feeling nostalgic). It's basically just corn chex, chocolate chips, peanut butter, butter and powder sugar. So simple, but so yummy!

My first meal that I cooked on my own was chorizo tostadas. Most of that meal is prep - grating cheese, chopping tomatoes and onions, etc. It's still one of my favorite things to cook...so easy and very delicious!

I remember making applesauce at home for extra credit for my home ec when I was in 6th grade. My mom couldn't help but she had to watch and fill out an evaluation. I got mad at her when she wrote that I almost cut my fingers slicing apples.

When I was little my mom signed me up for the "Cook-It Club" through the Hearth Song (I think that was the name too lazy to check) catalog. It was this awesome program that sent you a binder and apron in the mail and then each month you received a new chapter on themed recipes and a new cooking tool. I absolutely adored it, the excitement of receiving packages in the mail combined with the anticipation of getting to make something new with my mom. The item that stands out most in my mind as getting to make all by myself wasn't a meal it was apple crisp for dessert. I still have the book which I wrote, doodled, and put stickers all over and I still like the recipes and I smile at the things I wrote (i.e. "I love cooking" , "I

All by myself? I was 9. I made a whole roasted chicken stuffed with 40 cloves of garlic, steamed broccoli, mashed potatoes and a chocolate cake from the box.

My mom had just gotten out of the hospital and she wanted me to cook for her (show her that I could survive when she died) so I used the knowledge I got from watching her and from watching PBS cooking shows every week. My mom actually sent a thank you not to Jeff Smith (the frugal/pervy gourmet) to thank him for having children on his show and having them cook things that parents would think to complicated for a child to cook. We got a cookbook from him.

My nephews first dishes - the oldest made a baked cheesecake from a recipe that has over 60 separate steps and requires 2 hours of low temp baking then an hour in the oven with it turned off and the door propped open. He was 8.

Younger nephew - roasted pork tenderloin with ginger/soy glaze and roasted carrots. He was 6. That kid is a freaking wiz. His dad was so proud. He had two leftover pork loin sandwiches the next day.

I love this post! I think I made tuna fish first, if I remember correctly... of course, this is just opening a can and mixing drained fish with mayo but hey, I added celery salt just the way my mom liked it and I got a big scar on my left thumb from the knife I used to cut up slices of good old government cheese to go with it for her so.... this totally has to count for something! I was 6 when I did this so, I used that scar to tell my left from my right for years after that ha ha ha

WOW wackdoodle you learned how to use the oven and peel the garlic and everything else you had to do just from watching him on TV???

justanerd - from watching Julia, Jeff and the Galloping Gourmet anything on PBS I even watch this show called "The Victory Garden" which was great because they focused on growing seasonal fruits and veggies - then at the end of the show the main gardener's wife would show a recipe that used either the fruits or veggies from their garden. Plus, I watched my mom and her friends cook. One of her friend was from South America, another was Mexican-American, another Portuguese, a Greek, North Eastern American (RHODE ISLAND BABY! M&M cookies)and so on and my mom's favorite thing was to go to her friend's houses and learn how to cook their favorite dishes, things they learned to cook when they were younger. I also watched all of my grandma's (at least 4 of them) cook or baked and they loved to have helpers.

Since I was attached to my mom at the hip where ever she went I went. Some of her friends didn't have kids and the ones that did were trying to teach their kids their traditions too.

My mom was never worried about me and a hot oven or the flame on the stove. Once you get a minor burn from not being safe then you learn. But my mom had a lot of very sharp knives and those she was super cautious about letting me use because it never failed that I would suffer some major cut that should have had stitches. Same with my nephews, when they were small cooks/bakers we let them use the oven and stove supervised at first then by themselves. Knives we (my sister and I) were cautious about for awhile. After a few times of the boys cooking at a young age we let them go at it - with minimal supervision or interruption. It built their confidence in the kitchen. The main thing was to remind them to shut off the stove or oven when they were done and don't leave anything flammable on or near the stove.

Since their dad was handicapped there were times when if he was carrying for them alone because my sister and I weren't home they would cook for him. They would make tuna pot pies from scratch for him. And he would remind them to shut off the burner and oven and to clean up after themselves.

Obliviously my family is weird. I do have cousins who do not know to cook at all, so even at 45 they eat at their parents house nightly with their children and hubbies in tow.

Pancakes

It's been so long ago I'm not completely sure. I think it was either spaghetti or meatloaf.

I think it was Egg Bologna Cups - my mom bought me a cookbook just for children. I love cooking!

I've been in the kitchen ever since I could stand! The first thing I helped make was homemade pasta and marinara from scratch. It's my dad's specialty and I always loved to help roll out the dough into long strips!

I've always helped my mom in the kitchen so I can't remember one particular first meal. But I do remember helping out with this one dish several times when I was quite young--Polish crepes filled with fruit jelly, called palachinki. We would always make them for lunch when my brother wasn't home because he didn't like them.

spaghetti bolognaise - when my mom was at work and i was at home studying for exams, she used to ask me to make then every now and again. to this day it's my fav dish to make!

I don't remember. I've helped my mom in the kitchen since I was small. I do remember the first time I tried to bake a cake on my own and it turned out to be a disaster.

first meal, had to be breakfast i made scrambled eggs, bacon and toast.

I remember the first time I actually cooked, I was about six years old, sitting on my Dad's lap in the back yard while grilling steaks. He let me flip over the steaks, my Mom flipped out having me so near fire.

But the first real meal I cooked by myself was Fillet Mignon, wrapped in bacon, splash of Bourbon, salt and pepper, grilled rare. I recall also cooking rice pilaf and steamed asparagus. I think I was around eight or nine years old.

I was cooking before that though, just not by myself in the kitchen.

That's a hell of a first meal to cook.

I used to help my dad all the time in the kitchen...making pancakes, pudding, lasagna, Spanish rice, pizza, etc. I do remember the first thing I cooked by myself though. It was rice porridge with raisins. The recipe was from my American Girls Kirsten cookbook that I got when I was 9. It turned out great, but the only problem was that I sort of underestimated how long it had to cook. I started cooking it for breakfast and it wasn't done until closer to lunchtime. Oops. At least I didn't burn the rice: My dad warned me that if I burned the rice to the pan, I'd have to scrub it out.

First actual meal? Hm...I was about 6 and I learned how to (safely!) fry chicken and make mashed potatoes with garlic.

Now, the first thing I learned to cook in general was baking cookies, which I've done with my grandma ever since I can remember.

But what do you cook for your first 4th meal?

Ahem...special brownies.

Some of these posts are funny.

As for me, the first real meal I cooked was stir-fried tomatoes with beef and fried eggs. It was served over rice. I was about 8 or 9 years old. I remember being scared because it was cooked in a wok (a tall Chinese pan). I was not tall enough, and had to stand on a stool to hover above the wok. The sizzingly wok, hot oil was frightful.

Maybe that's why I don't like cooking. My first experience was traumatic.

WOW Wackdoodle, your family sounds like so much fun!!!
I just wanna make a copy of your comment about the and use it as a blueprint to use to give my kids the same great childhood you must have had !

Rhode Island!! Wooot!Woot!
where in RI? I lived in North Kingstown but I knew a lot of Italian grandmothers in Cranston, Warwick and Providence who were MEAN in the kitchen...I still know how to make awesome gnocci from them...

My son decided to cook me scrambled eggs for breakfast one morning when I was sick and he did it without any help, just my having shown him awhile before hat how to do it while I was doing it... I was proud and horrified at the same time lol He was 12

cookies when i was 12-13... my mom was speechless when she rea;lised they were so awesome. she made me do them from now on... and i learned the recepie in school! crazy...