All Swiss kids learn that in school. Boring as f**k.
Who wants to know how to make a thin, medium and thick white sauce? Seriously?
(Or were you sarcastic trolling?)
Hey, they learned to cook spaghetti bolognese and crunchy crumbed chicken drumsticks, my kids cook one of these all the time. 
I am sure there were some other recipes but these ones are their favourites!
Oh and carrot cake, another âstapleâ.
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There was an outcry not so long ago when Tiptopf got rid of a few of the old recipes and included new âtrendy onesâ (their words) like Chickpea curry (Chana Masala).
âBring back the all the shades of white sauce!â cried the readers. âWe donât want it replaced with that foreign muck tainting our food culture!â
New thread to keep the clutter off the birthday present ideas thread.
How have I survived for this long without knowing about the three types of white sauce?
The cooking classes here were somewhat more adventurous than that and they did make some really great stuff.
They also learnt about budgeting and nutritional value too and they often had to prepare a meal within a certain budget whilst also including key food groups and vitamins/minerals etc.
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The Swiss donât really cook very elaborate dishes (at least not the folks I know better), but theyâre usually willing to taste/enjoy some âexoticâ stuff. In a restaurant. Or cooked by someone else. 
On the other hand theyâre also much sportier than others.
Each with their own style, talents, inclinations etc.
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I donât think itâs really even a Swiss thing. If you are time-poor, you just donât have time to do elaborate dishes, and thatâs pretty universal. I envy the people who are able to spend hours on a week-day evening creating culinary specialities. Me, I come flying in at 6.30pm or later so if Iâve forgotten to take out a batch-cooked meal from the freezer, or Iâve got left overs, or stuff for a stir-fry, weâre down for beans on toast.
It does develop your ability to panic-think on your feet, though. 
Never heard before about Tiptopf.
Went to the website, I saw that we have irreconcilable cultural differences. Why pick that photo for Fleisch & Fisch?
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Yes you do if youâre so inclined: on weekends, on holidays. Obviously not every evening, that would be impossible even for most people I think.
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Yes, I tend to batch cook at weekends but have an appalling remembery to take them from the freezer at 7.30 am as Iâm tumbling out of the house to get to work.
âTake them out the evening before!â Yes, I know, I know⊠
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Not heard of Tiptopf either. Now I read it is âSwiss cultureâ 
Itâs a school-book, since 1986 apparently. The only thing that made it a best-seller is probably that school kids must buy it.
To me it looks like most of the stuff in there I wouldnât want to eat. Luckily most of my young friends seem to have binned it too after school.
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Itâs even the Headline on their website:
Der Tiptopf â ein StĂŒck Schweizer Kultur
Not having heard of it, youâre either showing your age or your ignorance - or possibly both.
Neither have I so I guess Iâm either old or ignorant or both.
Or I live in French speaking Switzerland.
Sounds like the Swiss version of Mrs. Beetonâs famous book.
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Itâs a Swiss-German thing. Been going on for sixty years or so.
We seem to have at least four copies in the house.
It looks like she is not as Swiss as she likes to make out. Putting a laughing emoji after her âSwiss -cultureâ comment suggests at least she learnt the passive-aggressive part of the Sswiss-German culture.
More like Delia Smith.
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I teach at a bilingual school where we use both Tiptopf and the French version, Croquâmenu, in our cooking classes. Being from Asia myself, Iâll admitâI was pretty skeptical about the recipes at first.
But when youâre teaching a group of 12 teens (we split the class in half for cooking) to make a different menu - starter, main dish and dessert - every week, with just three lessons to explain, prep, cook, eat, and fully clean the kitchenâthose simple recipes start to make a lot of sense!
A lot of the kids have never cooked before. They donât know what tools to use or how to use them, and things can get chaotic really quickly. Honestly, I have so much respect for any teacher who takes on this kind of class.
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Is there much difference between the two versions - in recipes specifically?
I wasnât intending to knock the teaching of cooking in schools with simple recipes and the basics but this is a thread split and my original answer was to show my disdain at the suggestion that a course for a twenty-year old man teaching Tiptopf style basics was a suitable present, and I offered an alternative.
Context is everything.
I learnt to have fun in the kitchen long before I learnt the basics and I still have no idea what a âwhite sauceâ is.
White sauce, also known as béchamel sauce, is a classic creamy sauce made from a roux of equal parts butter and flour, combined with milk. It serves as a versatile base for many dishes like lasagna, macaroni and cheese, chicken pot pie, and can be adapted into other sauces by adding ingredients like cheese or onions.
Thin has more milk, Thick has more flour.
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Recipe for the curiousâŠ