Do Italian Fathers and Men Cook ?

”Wouldn’t people look down on your father if they heard he was in the kitchen cooking?”she would say “ our father enters the kitchen… he uses so much seasoning” from The girl who wrote about loneliness by Kyung-Sook Shin

“Those of us lucky enough to have fathers who can cook amazing food would testify to a number of facts: they cook when they feel creative; they usually cook specialty dishes; and when they do cook, there’s a storm in the home, and a storm in the kadhai! “from an article by Shreya Goswami on Indiatoday.in

These sentences remind me of what was the typical Italian attitude towards fathers and men cooking.

Our father did not cook very much but he enjoyed doing things such as making jams and preparing roasted chestnuts .And some people were so surprised.

Then I read official statistics about actual Italian situation.

What emerges? That 78 percent of Italians know how to cook, and that half of them do it willingly (36.7 percent as “fun or relaxation” and 16.2 as “pleasant necessity”) without too many differences between men and women . The remaining 26 percent live this task in a heavy way: it is the voice of the housewives, for whom it is a real job. In fact, it is still a woman who usually prepares food for the family in 67.4 percent of cases. But it is also true that 58% of men cook “often” or at least “sometimes” and, among these, 42.4 in the 25-34 age group do it with enthusiasm, especially in the South.

Isn’t it great?