IELTS Speaking Part 1: Food and cooking
Rich in specific vocabulary and the easiest topic in Part 1 to sound fluent on, if you name actual dishes.
Every candidate can answer it, it is culturally interesting, and it produces concrete nouns quickly — which is exactly what the examiner wants to hear in the opening minutes.
Questions you can expect
Asked quickly, one after another, with no comment on your answers. Read them aloud and answer each in two or three sentences before you look at the approach below.
- What kind of food do you like?
- Do you cook at home?
- Who does most of the cooking in your house?
- Do you prefer eating at home or eating out?
- What is a typical meal in your country?
- Have your eating habits changed in recent years?
- Do you eat much fruit and vegetables?
- Is there any food you dislike?
- Do you ever try food from other countries?
- What did you have for breakfast today?
How to answer this topic
- Name dishes. A named dish is worth more than three sentences about liking food generally.
- Use cooking verbs — fry, steam, roast, simmer — rather than 'make' for everything.
- The dislike question is underused. A specific food you cannot stand, with the reason, is memorable and easy to say fluently.
- 'What did you have for breakfast' catches people out. It is past simple and it is asking for a real answer.
Vocabulary this topic invites
a staple
for something eaten constantly in your country
home-cooked
the standard compound adjective
I'm not fussy
natural for having no strong preferences
an acquired taste
for food people learn to like
grab something quick
for eating in a hurry
it's an occasion
for meals that are events rather than fuel
What costs people marks here
Saying 'I like healthy food' or 'I like delicious food'.
Delicious is not a category and healthy is not a cuisine. Name a dish, name an ingredient, name the meal you had yesterday.
Three of these, answered at band 8
Read these for the shape, not the words — two or three sentences with a reason or an example attached. The details are invented and yours should be your own; an examiner can hear a recited answer, and it costs you more than the answer gains.
What kind of food do you like?
I'll eat most things, but the food I actively seek out is south Indian — dosas, anything with coconut and curry leaves. There's a place near my office run by a family from Kerala and I go far too often. I think it's partly that it's the food I grew up with, so it tastes like a Sunday.
Why it worksSpecific dishes rather than a cuisine label, and the closing simile is unusual and earned.
Do you like cooking?
Very much, and I'm better at it than I used to be. I cook five or six nights a week, partly for the obvious reasons and partly because it's the only part of my day where the task is finished when I stop. Work is never finished. Dinner is.
Why it worksThe final contrast is short, rhythmic and clearly a real thought.
Has your diet changed in recent years?
It has, though gradually rather than through any decision. I eat far less meat than I did five years ago — not for any strong ethical reason, mostly because I got better at cooking vegetables and stopped needing it. I also eat much later than I used to, which I'm told is bad.
Why it worksPresent perfect throughout, and 'gradually rather than through any decision' is a precise description of how habits actually change.
Other Part 1 topics
Weather
A pure comparison topic — it exists to hear whether you can contrast seasons without saying 'hot' four times.
Travel
Past, present and future in one topic, which is precisely why examiners like it early.
Transport
A practical topic with its own precise vocabulary, and one where a real complaint makes a better answer than a neutral description.
Music
Everyone has an answer and almost everyone gives the same one — the genre name and nothing else.
Reading
A topic where the honest answer is often 'not much', and where that answer can still score well if you handle it properly.
Sport
Works for people who do no sport at all — watching, school memories and opinions are all valid material.
Answer these at speaking speed
Oliver asks Part 1 questions the way the real examiner does — quickly, with no reaction, moving on before you have finished deciding what you think. Reading them is not the same exercise. The first test is free.
This guide is written from the published IELTS Speaking band descriptors, in our own words. For the official wording, see the British Council's band descriptors. MockLive AI is an independent practice tool and is not affiliated with IELTS, the British Council, IDP or Cambridge University Press & Assessment.