What’s that saying? Men are chefs, women cook? I’ve seen a lot of stuff in that vein this week, and I couldn’t resist throwing it all together in a big pot of delicious blog stew.
Let’s start with this hilarious article from the Daily Mail. According to the article, manly men Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver have shown men that it is ok, even desirable, to cook—as long as it’s done on an intermittent or celebrity basis.
As Sadie at Jezebel points out, of course cooking is awesome when you’re doing it for fun and several possible forms of profit. It’s the chore of feeding your family every day and night that falls to women. And don’t pretend it doesn’t fall to women.
My mother always sat at the head of our table because it was closest to the kitchen so she could grab anything else we might need after she’d cooked and served our dinner. And it always seems to be my girlfriends who take charge of feeding the group on vacation.
Pop culture certainly sees cooking as women’s work, as my new hero illustrates in her latest brilliant video. And, on a much more serious note, the Washington Post has a story reminding us just how hard some women have to work and how much they have to give up to feed their families.
But the last line of the Daily Mail article is very telling: “Being actively involved in cooking means that you’re a good modern man playing your part in making the household run efficiently. Cooking is actually a more rewarding and creative form of domestic contribution.”
No kidding cooking is one of the sexier chores, but it’s not the only one that needs to be done on a daily basis. How much clearer do women have to be? I guess we just need more attractive men showing us that it’s ok to do housework. I hear Daniel Craig does all his own laundry, you know.
