You need to be very specific when giving them directions when it comes to household things. My son just came in the room he wanted to know the healthiest way to cook chicken breast. I told him to broil it in the toaster oven. He asked can "I bbq it in there?" I said "no you don't bbq in the toaster oven". "Put it on the bottom rack and put it on broil". He ask "do I season it before or after". "Season before after 15 minutes flip it". So 15 minutes later I go into the kitchen the toaster oven was off and the chicken was still quite raw I look closer and the child put the chicken straight on the rack no tray no drip pan. I see all this chicken juice on the bottom of the toaster oven. I called him and told him and he said "you never mentioned a rack is it bad now?" Reminds me when he first started to wash his own clothes and asked me about the detergent and I told him to measure it and put it in the cup on the top on the inside of the washing machine. He didn't read that the cup were he put it said bleach only. TEENAGERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

SORRY!!!

I haven't had a teen around for 9 years but I "DO" remember those days!

Well golly gee, at least he is trying to eat healthy!!! He is a teenager for goodness sake we can't ask for to much. Just wait until he figures out how to make homemade french fries to go with the healthy chicken. Would you like my son to send him the directions? Naturally G-ma bought him the deep fryer so he wouldn't do it on top the stove and catch the house on fire. BTW if he tries to use the George Foreman type grill remind him there is a little drip catcher that has to be under it.....yes Mikey even for chicken... sorry I had a flash back.

I have four brothers and one of them used my mom's good silver serving platter as a pizza pan one night! Amazingly enough he is still alive. Unleashed in the kitchen they can become quite a danger. Good luck.

You want to hear something scary? My little sister is a teenager and last year she put a big glass orangina bottle in the freezer to speed up the chilling. She happened to stick it in the "ice chute." Of course she forgets about it and it explodes. Skip to next morning when my mom is making smoothies. She decides it needs a bit more ice and just uses her hand to get a few more cubes, and gets cut and notices the glass. So she dumps the contents of the blender out in the sink and sees the tons of tiny shards in the smoothie. If she hadn't gotten those last cubes with her hand they would have all, including their dog who gets ice in his water sometimes, ingested that glass and gotten internal lesions or who knows what!

I have raised 5 sons and am finally on my last 19 year old I worked very hard with the idea that they should at least know how to cook simple stuff and then clean up their own mess (apparently this doesn't include counters ). Now the last one wants to be a chef . Now I thought gee I finally got through to at least one of them. So he is now working in a fairly good restaurant and loves the job. The only thing that gets me is when he is home he will ask the same questions about cooking as the others did and leaves the same mess . He doesn't seem to know about cleaning as you go or at least do it after and will put food in the micro wave without a plate YUK. Apparently I didn't tell him to put it on a plate. I have come to the conclusion it is a faze that lasts until they get married and their wives take over where we left off

All I have to say is Lord help the poor woman who marries my son...he is high maintenance, for certain! Just like his father.

My youngest son is now 25. When he was ages 10 and up, he cooked for all of the neighbor kids, especially in the summer.
I would look out in the backyard, and they would be lined up at the picnic table waiting for their hotdogs, hamburgers, or bratwurst.
It did get expensive, but I counted it as hobby/entertainment expense for him.
And he was always experimenting with different combinations of spices; it was so much fun to watch him cook.
He has been married for 5 years and does almost all of their cooking. His wife is very lucky, I think.