Is Cooking Still a Part of Our Eating Practices? Analysing the Decline of a Practice with Time-Use Surveys

Abstract

People now spend less time doing housework in general, and cooking in particular. So is cooking still a central feature of our daily eating practices? This article compares trends in household cooking durations in France and the USA in the period 1985–2010 using time-use surveys and practice theory. We ask how the association between cooking and eating at home has changed over time, and how it has contributed to the decline in the time spent on household cooking. Descriptive statistics show that US households spent 20 minutes less time per day cooking in 2010 than in 1985 (15 minutes less time per day in France). Linear regressions indicate that the association between cooking duration and the number of eating events at home has declined in the USA but not in France. The Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition method points to this fact as the primary reason for the change in cooking time in the USA; in France, decreased cooking time is accounted for primarily by changes in population characteristics. French and American food practices have followed gradually diverging trajectories, with cooking less a feature of eating practices – even at home – in the USA, whereas the association between eating and preparing food at home remains stable in France.