As with everything nowadays, men and women are constantly trying to be the best at different things. Whether it be crafts, gardening, or even maintaining their cars – there will always be a level of competitiveness between the genders.
In this article, just for fun, I decided to take a look and discuss some of the things that men and women do differently in the kitchen when it comes to cooking.
Please don’t take it too seriously. We all know cooking is not a question of gender…
Difference 1 : Men Feel Overwhelmed, Women Feel Relaxed
Men tend to be more competitive than women, and this doesn’t stop in the kitchen. Blame the testosterone!
If you watch a man cook then you’ll notice that they are incredibly specific about every detail of their cooking espcially if there is some sort of competition. They’ll spend more time than necessary on the minor details of cooking because, in their head, it’s all about perfection and being the best.
Women, on the other hand, are much more relaxed in the kitchen, can cook an entire 3-course meal without breaking a sweat, and still perfect their dish.
Difference 2 : Rescuing a Disastrous Dish
Another thing that differs men from women in the kitchen is the way that they react to making a mistake when cooking.
When a man makes a mistake, they instantly freak out and in some cases, overreact and start cooking from scratch. This just adds to their frustration of cooking and as a result increases the chance of them making more mistakes.
When a woman makes a mistake whilst cooking, they’re able to quickly realise what the problem is, fix it, and get on with their cooking.
Difference 3 : Men Like to Collect
Even outside of the kitchen a lot of men can be considered “hoarders”. This means that if they have a small amount of a certain spice left, there’s no chance of them throwing it away – there’s always that small chance that they’ll need to use it before they head to the shop the next day (or at least they think so).
Women aren’t as obsessed with their ingredients and if it’s taking up space in their cupboard, and it’s nearly finished, they’ll throw it away without a second thought.
Difference 4 : Men Like Meat
Men tend to go heavier on using meat than women. Perhaps we’ll never know why but the fact is, it’s true.
When watching a woman cook, they’ll see meat just like any other ingredient and will only use a set amount of it. Men like meat more than women do, so they like to add as much meat as possible and will make it the centre of their dish.
Difference 5 : Women Are Subtle with Spices
Spices can really bring a dish to life (not literally, who would want to eat a living chicken risotto?), but there’s a line that you cross where you’ve added too much spice; men are known to cross this line, but still enjoy their cooking nonetheless.
Spice adds flavour, and most men want to make their dish as flavorful as possible whereas women like to stick to the book, follow their recipe strictly, and only add the specified amount of spice.
Top Tip! If you’re new to cooking and you want to discover some new flavours that you can add to your dishes, buy some sample packs of herbs and spices when you’re out shopping. This can be a great way to expand your horizon when cooking.
Difference 6 : Men Avoid Baking
If there’s one thing that men avoid when cooking, it’s the baking cakes side of things.
For whatever reason, men don’t feel as though baking cakes is as masculine as cooking – which is understandable – but baking is a huge part of cooking. Everyone has a sweet tooth, so why not exercise it every once in a while?
Women are flexible in the kitchen and will happily switch between cooking and baking as they see fit. The big benefit to this is that if you’re trying to get better at cooking in general, you can learn a whole new set of skills that are specific to baking, which may be of use when cooking dinner.
I personally love baking, I don’t really feel less of a man when I bake but I know some do…see? I told you, nothing is set in stone…
Difference 7 : Women Aren’t Big on Barbecues
Envision a garden party and in the garden, you see a barbecue grill. Behind that grill, wearing an apron and holding a spatula – do you see a man or a woman? You see a man. Why is that?
Men are more comfortable behind barbecues than women are and for whatever reason, it’s rare to see a woman behind the grill and cooking burgers. Standing behind a grill feels like home for men and as a result, they tend to cook better than they do while in a kitchen.
Maybe it’s the fact that they can relax, cook some burgers (one of the easiest things to cook, unless you go above and beyond to cook a gourmet burger), and enjoy a beer outdoors.
Difference 8 : Men Like to Make a Show of It
When a woman gets into the kitchen, they relax, take a mental note of what needs to be done, and get to work. Their goal is to produce a delicious meal and that’s all.
On the other hand, men like to show off in front of people and impress where possible. Let’s face it, most men don’t cook as often as women do so when they do, it’s a treat and they want to make a show of it.
Difference 9 : Precision
A lot of cooking recipes rely on the chef being precise on their ingredients, while other recipes you can just put in a “sprinkle of this” and a “cup of that”.
Women who are following a cooking recipe will follow the recipe step by step, exactly how they are instructed to. As we said previously, women are more relaxed when they make mistakes but this is because they very rarely make mistakes. Ultimately, the lack of mistakes is due to how closely they follow their recipes.
if there is no competition, men who follow a recipe’s instructions are more relaxed and don’t rely as much on the recipe as much as women. While women are overall more relaxed, men won’t follow the recipe exactly as you should and will go from their own knowledge (even if this doesn’t always bid well).
Difference 10 : Women Clean Up
To end this list, women are a lot tidier than men are.
Men cook with the mindset that, “If I make a pile of the dirty dishes then I can clean them up afterwards”, but as you probably know, that never happens.
Woman adapt to a different mindset and are more organized. While they cook, they will think to themselves, “Alright, this will take 2 minutes to start simmering. I can clean a few dishes and get those out of the way in the meantime.”
If you are an aspiring chef then thinking like a woman (even if you’re a man) is the best way to think. If you get the dishes cleaned and put away while you are cooking, you don’t have to come back to them later on.
How These Differences Impact Their Cooking
I will repeat it again. The bottom line – these differences have little (if any) impact on the final dish that has been cooked. While the process and the approach may be different, the same outcome is achieved.
When it comes to cooking, the purpose is to enjoy every aspect of it. The preparation, cooking, presentation – all of it! As long as a delicious meal is prepared that can be enjoyed, none of these differences matter at all. As we said, cooking is not a quetsion of gender, we all have our own cooking style.
Sources:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/men/relationships/11161139/Do-men-and-women-cook-differently.html
http://www.seriouseats.com/2009/06/do-men-cook-differently-than-women-gender-in-the-kitchen-grant-achatz-dana-cowin.html