Teens Turn to TikTok to Learn How to Cook Hassle-Free Recipes

From the tortilla hack to dalgonga coffee, TikTok is not short of recipes and cooking tips. TikTok food trends have made it fast, easy, and fun to put a twist on classics or learn something new. Additionally, the app is encouraging teens to get into cooking, as the quick and concise videos cut out all the hassle and over-complicated steps provided by traditional cookbooks or online recipes.

Ever since lockdown had people stuck inside and isolated from their usual foodie haunts, it seems everyone has got into cooking. Whether it be baking sourdough bread or whipping up a mock takeaway dish, many people found themselves getting more adventurous in the kitchen. The wealth of food videos on platforms like TikTok and YouTube has no doubt spurred this on, providing new and clever ways to cook up a great breakfast, lunch, dinner, or snack.

Lockdown saw the number of food videos on TikTok sore, with the infamous tortilla hack recipe, created by Australian TikToker @crystalscookingfun, being viewed 31,000 times within 15 hours of posting. A few weeks later, a 2018 recipe for feta pasta was revived on TikTok (earning 600 million views) and the same thing happened all over again: it was an instant hit and had people worldwide rushing to test out the viral recipe at home. Soon users of the app were falling in love with whipped instant coffee (#DalgonaCoffee, 460.4 million views) and amazingly fluffy ‘Cloud Bread’ (#CloudBread, 3.1 billion views). As cooking became more popular on the platform, the most viral and viewed dishes were those labeled as an ingenious “hack” or shortcut. Cutting corners has never resulted in such tasty results.

Quick and Easy Viral Recipes Are Sparking A Culinary Passion In Teens

Most of all, teenagers have become encouraged to get cooking due to the simplicity of the food videos. For them, it cuts out the overly wordy descriptions and complex lists of ingredients involved in nearly all traditional recipes. The simple video format provides a quick step-by-step guide to create novel yet delicious meals, making it no-sweat to copy at home. Moreover, the recipes require few ingredients and or readily accessible ones, often those already sitting in the pantry or fridge.

 For teens, it’s encouraging to be able to make something from scratch which not only tastes great but is fast to whip up and requires minimal searching for expensive or rare ingredients. Through turning to TikTok recipes for lunches and snacks, they can also learn more about nutrition and how to create a balanced meal, such as a buddha bowl, or even how to follow certain diets, such as keto or veganism.

On top of this, teens who’ve found their culinary footsteps through simple TikTok recipes gain a vital set of skills and become inspired to try their hand at progressively more complex or bigger recipes. This fuels a feeling of independence as they no longer rely on their parents to cook for them. When they eventually move out, they’ll be fully equipped to make better meals than just instant noodles or beans on toast. In addition, teens fall in love with cooking and baking through these trending recipe videos, so not only do they learn the all-important ability to cook for themselves, but they discover a new passion along the way.