Our regular classes are hands on or demonstrational and can be scheduled on both days and evenings throughout the week. They are limited to 6 persons per class providing ample personal attention in a relaxed atmosphere. Couples and groups of 2 or more can arrange a class on an open date and custom select the cuisine and menu. Classes run approximately 3 to 4 hours and conclude with a meal prepared during the class. Even the more seemingly advanced classes have expert instruction that allows the novice cook participation and insight. Classes and dinners cost $55.00 to $85.00 per person inclusive except for special sessions involving luxury ingredients.
Here are some examples of classes, demonstrations and private dinners that we offer:
Alsatian Choucroute
Learn how to make one of the great classic winter dishes of all time. Each café throughout France offers up it’s own version. This one sticks to its classical roots. Sauerkraut braised in juniper scented Riesling with bacon and apples, two kinds of sausages, ham, pork belly, duck confit and potatoes.
Authentic German Cooking
There is more to German cooking than throwing sausages in a pan. Participants in this class will learn the finer points in preparing some Teutonic classics.
We will be preparing:
Potato Pancakes with Homemade Apple Sauce
Lentil Soup with Bockwurst
Braised Red Cabbage
Veal Schnitzel
Semolina Dumplings
Butter Cake
French Brasserie Dinner
A brasserie is a hyrid cross between a café and a restaurant. With informal hours and
professional service, the French brasserie offers a style of cuisine that typifies the Parisian way of life. Participants at this dinner will dine on classic brasserie fare
The menu includes:
Onion Soup
Frisee with Lardons
Mussels Normandy
Beef Burgundy
Tart Tatin
French Country Lunch
With the weather warming up and people looking towards lighter dining, lunch becomes more prominent. Throughout the summer we will feature a series of Wednesday lunch classes to teach and inspire students to take that special meal of the week into the daylight. The menu for this class will be:
Mussels braised in cider
Country style pâté with traditional condiments
Herb poached chicken with ratatouille
Lavender and honey ice cream
Greek Taverna Lunch
With the weather warming up and people looking towards lighter dining, lunch becomes more prominent. Throughout the summer we will feature a series of Wednesday lunch classes to teach and inspire students to take that special meal of the week into the daylight. The menu for this class will be:
Grilled and marinated octopus
Classic Greek village salad
Lamb braised in a clay pot with orzo
Rose tartlets
Greek Taverna Dinner
If you go to Greece one of the highlights of the trip will be dining at a taverna on the traditional Greek rustic cooking of the Islands and countryside. This dinner will showcase some of the classics of Greek cuisine.
The menu will be:
Greek Village Salad with Sheeps Milk Feta
Snails with Tomatoes, Cinnamon and Pasta
Sea Bass Roasted with Oregano
Lamb Baked in a Clay Pot
Giant Elephant Beans
Bahklava with Mastic Ice Cream
Gumbo, Jambalaya and Étouffée Workshop
These examples of classic New Orleans cooking are so often misinterpreted and ill prepared. This class will explore the history of these dishes and allow participants the opportunity to prepare them correctly. We will prepare:
Chicken Gumbo
Shrimp Jambalaya
Crawfish Étouffée
Italian Vegetarian
Rosemary, onion and olive Foccacia
A summer soup from the Marches region of Italy that features Farro, an ancient grain that was a staple of the Roman legions, leafy greens, asparagus and young potatoes.
Hand rolled Pici, a rustic pasta from the Siena region of Italy with fresh herbs, roasted garlic, lemon and braised artichokes.
Risotto with butternut squash, sun-dried tomatoes and roasted cauliflower
Homemade goats milk ricotta with chocolate and almond biscotti.
Italian Country Lunch
With the weather warming up and people looking towards lighter dining, lunch becomes more prominent. Throughout the summer we will feature a series of Wednesday lunch classes to teach and inspire students to take that special meal of the week into the daylight. The menu for this class will be:
Rustic soup of faro and greens
Fresh pasta with walnut herb sauce and shrimp
Milk braised veal with creamy polenta
Baked crepes filled with apricot cream
Japanese Home Cooking
Sushi is what first comes to mind when one talks of Japanese cuisine, however, the Japanese have a rich tradition of country style home cooking that we seldom see in restaurants. Participants in this class will discover the beauty and subtlety of this style of cooking and pick up some of the basic skills to prepare it at home. Participants will first make Dashi, the standard Japanese soup stock, then use it to prepare a ginger rice porridge seasoned with chrysanthemum. We will the make spicey stir fried soba noodles with sake and pork, our main course will be a braised chicken and vegetable dish with 7 spice hot pepper accompanied by eggplant in sesame and bean sauce.
Mediterranean Seafood Cookery
When one thinks of the Mediterranean one has to think of all the wonderful seafood cookery practiced on the coastlines of Southern Europe and North Africa. This class will explore those traditions and prepare some classic dishes while learning the correct techniques for handling seafood. In this class we will prepare:
Tangiers style stuffed calamari
Sea bass baked in a salt crust
Sicilian style marinated swordfish
Spanish style bacalao with shrimp, saffron, leeks and potatoes
Mediterranean Vegetarian
This class will take you around the Mediterranean using traditional ingredients that are readily available to the American cook. This is a perfect class for those who would like to expand their repertoire of meatless cooking. We will start off with a summer soup from the Marches region of Italy that features Farro, an ancient grain that was a staple of the Roman legions, leafy greens, asparagus and young potatoes. Our second course will be giant elephant beans from the Kastoria region of Greece simmered with tomatoes and cinnamon and served with baked sheep’s milk feta. We will hand roll Pici, a rustic spaghetti from the Siena region of Italy and pair it with braised domestic and wild mushrooms. For our dessert we will prepare Moroccan date rolls with orange salad.
Modern Greek Cuisine
Greek cooking is perhaps one of the oldest cuisines in Western culture.
Known for it’s deep, hearty, soul satisfying flavors and rustic taverna style presentation, Greek cuisine has universal appeal. Unfortunately most Greek restaurants in this country and even many in Greece feature generic concoctions prepared with cheap ingredients that garner mass-market audiences without doing justice to authentic Greek cooking. This class will focus on taking Greek classics, done properly, but with a lighter touch and more contemporary presentation. We will take the classic Avgolemono soup and turn it into a light refreshing first course foam. Crispy fried salt cod will be paired with garlicky skordalia puree and citrus pickled beets. We will make Individual Moussakas with wild greens. For dessert we will prepare spiced rice pudding with apricots, cherries and sheep’s milk yoghurt.
Modern Scandinavian Demonstration Dinner
We have a vacation home in Sweden and, after spending ample time there and traveling around other parts of Scandinavia, we have come to realize that the cooking there today defies all stereotypes. Traditional ingredients have fused with outside influences to create a hybrid that is bold and exciting. The menu for this dinner will be:
Juniper Apple Soup
Lobster Rolls with pickled pears and Ginger Granita
Crispy Duck with Glögg Sauce and Mango Risotto
Black Pepper Cheesecake with Cranberry Compote
The Rustic Cooking of Sicily
The island of Sicily offers a style of cuisine unique to the Italian kitchen. Influenced by the Greeks, Moors and French, the Sicilian table is redolent with fragrant spices, aromatic herbs and a rustic cooking style that embodies the best of Mediterranean gastronomy. We will prepare tuna carpaccio with peppered baby arugula and mustard sauce, sweet and sour rabbit with olives, almonds and capers, handmade saffron tagliatelle and homemade goats milk ricotta with chocolate.
Southern Cooking for Yankees
Living in New England one has little exposure to true Southern cooking. A lot of what is served as such above the Mason-Dixon line would not pass muster to a true Southerner. This class will teach you the basics of genuine Southern cooking.
We will prepare fresh corn soup with butter bean dumplings, oyster pie, southern fried free range chicken with milk gravy, herbed cheese grits and Bourbon pecan chocolate chip Pie.
Tapas Workshop
Tapas were last years black but the concept is still pretty popular today because the culinary scene in Spain is about as hot as it gets. Much of what is being dished out in Spain these days seems über modern but, as with any old world cuisine, it is deeply rooted in tradition. We will prepare 8 different tapas starting with Catalan tomato bread with Manchego cheese, Galician copper stewed octopus with paprika, tomato seed fillets and watermelon pinchas, fried fresh artichokes with Serrano ham, littleneck clams in green sauce, rack of lamb with honey allioli, meatballs with peaches and rare tuna with an Andalucian salad.
Thai Demonstration Dinner
The problem with much of what is billed as Thai cooking in the United States is that it is prepared with factory farm meats and processed foods. As with most Chinese food served in America, Thai cuisine has strayed from authenticity to the land of “adapted for the American palate”.
This dinner will demonstrate how to prepare some standards of the Thai kitchen correctly.
The Menu for this dinner will be
Lemongrass Chicken Coconut Soup
Red Curried Fish Cakes with Cucumber Peanut Relish and Sweet Chili Sauce
Massaman Beef with Sticky Rice
Tapioca and Pandana Leaf Pudding.
Traditional New England Cooking
The cooking of New England is steeped in rich tradition and draws upon both the foodstuffs indigenous to the area and those brought by the old world settlers. Unfortunately, much of what is today pawned off as “Traditional New England” is a hodge podge of processed foods and a mere shadow of a glorious culinary heritage. Participants in this class will learn the history and preparation of genuine New England fare adapted to today’s kitchen.
We will be making:
Salt Cod and Potato Cakes
Oyster Bread Pudding
Yankee Pot Roast
Indian Pudding Custard
Artisan Sourdough Bread Baking
10,000 years later and there's no better way to raise bread. In the beginning, all risen breads were sourdough, or naturally leavened, breads, and there is no real reason they can't be today. The move to using commercial baking yeast was brought about to save time, not to make better bread. With practice, you can get the taste, crumb and rise you want from sourdough. This Class will teach you how to make, feed and maintain a sourdough starter, how to transform it into a firm starter and then how to make that into really good bread. You will learn the proper techniques for handling the dough and how to bake it for optimum results. Why pay $5.00 and up for a loaf of bread when you can bake your own for less than $1.00?
Basic Baking Skills
Baking is perhaps one of the most difficult kitchen skills to master. You can follow a recipe faultlessly step by step but without the knowledge of proper technique and the kitchen science involved, a recipe that seems like a no-brainer can easily flop. This class is designed to give you the necessary knowledge about the ingredients, the techniques and the chemistry that combine the art and science of perfect cooking.
In this class you will learn how to make an apple pie with the flakiest of crusts, super light buttermilk biscuits, flowerless chocolate torte with bittersweet chocolate genache, rosemary foccacia and the best way to make a perfect cookie dough.
Braising Meats in the Oven
Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin the famous French gastronome once observed, “Some people are born to cook but they must learn to braise”, How true, Braising takes time and patience and its outcome requires much more exactitude than other techniques of the savory kitchen. This class will give you the braising “chops” that your dinner guests will assume you must have been born with. We will braise Asian spiced shortribs, chicken in wine, duck legs with prunes and potatoes.
While the meats are in the oven we will prepare some German style dumplings to accompany our meal and discuss the science involved in the braising technique.
Chocolate Workshop
This class is designed to not only teach the participants various basic recipes but to also provide an education in the history and science of chocolate
We will be making:
Chocolate Mousse
Flourless Chocolate Cake
Chocolate truffles
Bittersweet Chocolate Pudding
Belgian Chocolate Soup
Cold Soups for the Summer
When the dog days of summer are upon us a chilled soup as the main course can be refreshing and satisfying. In this class we will prepare avocado with citrus poached lobster, white gazpacho with chicken and grape salad, yellow heirloom tomato and mango with wild salmon tartar and for dessert cantaloupe and Riesling with minted Greek yoghurt. This class isn’t just about cold soup, as you will also learn the most humane way to dispatch a live lobster and work with local small farm chicken and the best wild salmon.
Cooking Skills for the Novice
Once upon a time people grew up learning cooking skills passed down from their mother and grandmother. At least the girls did. Today, many do not, or did not get that opportunity. If you would like to cook, but could use some hands-on basics before tackling the recipes from a book, this is the class for you. Participants will learn how to cook green beans, carrots and broccoli so they are properly done and not a pool of mush, perfect potatoes au gratin, a bistro styleroast chicken with pan gravy that stays moist, chocolate mousse that tastes as though it came from a French restaurant. We will discuss the science behind the cooking and the ways to foolproof these techniques
Essential Oils Demonstration Dinner
Aroma permeates every cuisine from ancient to modern and it is evident that aroma not taste that is our primary experience of food. Essential oils have been around for a long time but it wasn’t until recently that chefs really started to take notice and incorporated them into everyday cooking. This class is a demonstrational four course dinner that utilizes aromatic oils in every course. The menu will be
Warm Apple and Cinnamon Bark Soup with Cocao
Braised DuckSea Bass with Rose Beaurre Blanc and PorciniBlack Pepper
Scented Pork Confit
Jasmine Tea Panna Cotta with Lavender Shortbread
Gourmet cooking with a modest budget
In today’s economy diners are looking to eat well without spending a large amount of cash. This class will teach you how to prepare dishes that taste and present “out of the ordinary” while remaining affordable. The participants will prepare:
Asian style fish cakes with ponzu and arugula
Fresh kielbasa with fois gras scented lentils
Gingery chicken braised in coconut broth
Apple crepe cake with orange custard
Gourmet Pizza at Home
When it comes to making pizza at home, store bought crust doesn’t quite cut it. And frozen pizza? Lets not even go there. This class will teach you what kind of flour to use and how to easily make 2 types of dough, crispy thin and deep dish. Also you will learn how to properly top and bake the pie so you won’t end up with a soggy mess.
Gourmet Vegan
Every year there are more vegan cookbooks that offer up good solid fare but seem to fall short in extravagance and presentation. Being vegan has nothing to do with taking a vow of poverty. In this class we will prepare vegan cuisine with high quality gourmet ingredients while employing the presentation techniques from upscale restaurants. For the first course we will make rosemary foccacia and an antipasto of shredded eggplant with shaved fennel, fresh artichokes braised in olive oil and peeled miniature heirloom tomatoes with 25 year old artisan balsamic vinegar. For our main course we will prepare a risotto of bamboo rice, asparagus, macadamia nut butter
Gumbo, Jambalaya and Étouffée Workshop
These examples of classic New Orleans cooking are so often misinterpreted and ill prepared. This class will explore the history of these dishes and allow participants the opportunity to prepare them correctly. We will prepare:
Chicken Gumbo
Shrimp Jambalaya
Crawfish Étouffée
Introduction to Raw Food
More and more people are experimenting with raw food or incorporating elements of it into their daily dietary routine. With nothing heated above 118 F and strictly vegan, working with raw food recipes means replacing sautéing, baking, boiling, steaming and frying with sprouting, soaking, dehydrating and juicing. This class will teach you some of the basic techniques and recipes of raw foods. In this class we will prepare “cream of mushroom soup”, “mashed potatoes and gravy”, “fettuccine alfredo”, and “carrot cake”. The names are familiar but the methods and ingredients will surprise you.
Knife Skills
A knife skills class can dramatically improve your efficiency in the kitchen, assuage fears and boost confidence. This class will teach you how to choose the right knives for you, how to hold and use them safely and which knife to use for different tasks. After a couple of hours of slicing, dicing, chopping, mincing, filleting and paring we will turn the fruits of our labor into a shared meal.
Mastering the Chicken
Chicken is perhaps the most popular meat in America and still one of the most affordable ones. Unfortunately production methods have all but robbed the chicken of its flavor and, in some instances, made it a less than healthy dining choice. This class will focus on methods of handling and preparing chicken. We will work with organic small farm birds but will also cook up a factory farm grocery store bird for a taste comparison. We will truss a bird with butchers twine to make a perfect bistro style roast chicken and potatoes, we will debone, stuff and sauté breasts, slow braise the legs coq au vin style and do two preparations with the wings, “chicken lollypops” with the upper and deboned, mushroom stuffed with the lower.
Octopus and Squid
This class will familiarize the participants with the handling and preparation of everyone’s favorite Cephalopods. It is important when preparing these to have a good understanding of proper cooking technique as there is a fine line between tender and juicy and too rubbery to chew.
In this class we will prepare:
Fried Calamari with Homemade Tartar Sauce
Braised Octopus with Red Wine, Onions and Macaroni
Thai Style Squid in Coconut Milk
Baked Stuffed Calamari
Marinated Octopus Salad
Old School Gourmet
Back in the day going out to an upscale restaurant in, no matter what part of America, the menus at all of the top restaurants were pretty much the same. People had three martini lunches, decadence was in fashion, waiter flambéed nearly everything table side, and although you won’t see very much of this cooking nowadays north of Palm Beach, it is still satisfying and delicious.
We will make Oysters Rockefeller, Clams Casino, Flaming Wilted Spinach and Bacon Salad and for an entrée, Beef Wellington. For dessert we will flambé Crepes Suzette.
Oven Braising Techniques
Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin the famous French gastronome once observed, “Some people are born to cook but they must learn to braise”, How true, Braising takes time and patience and its outcome requires much more exactitude than other techniques of the savory kitchen. This class will give you the braising “chops” that your dinner guests will assume you must have been born with. We will braise shortribs with mushrooms, chicken in wine, duck legs with prunes and potatoes, herbed tomatoes and fresh fennel bulbs.
Pasta Workshop
This class teaches the art of fresh pasta making. We will make dough from semolina, corn, and buckwheat flours along with egg noodle dough. We will cut pasta shapes that are appropriate to the different types of dough and also make filled pasta. This class will explain the science behind the choice of different flours, the proper cooking techniques for obtaining the best results, which sauces go with what shapes and the ease in which anyone, with a little understanding, can create beautiful artisan pasta at home.
Raw Desserts
As opposed to baking raw food deserts require a whole different level of preparation.
This class will teach you, by sprouting, soaking, dehydrating and marinating, how to prepare ahead some of the building blocks of the raw food desert pantry. In addition to learning how to prepare these staples we will make raspberry tiramisu, crunch bar torte, carrot cake, peach cheesecake, carob mousse and cashew butter fudge cookies.
Sous Vide Cooking
Sous vide is French for "under vacuum" and describes a method of cooking in vacuum sealed plastic pouches at low temperatures for long times. At high end restaurants across the country like Per Se, Charlie Trotter’s and Alinea the intense heat and scrape of pans against the stove is giving way to an almost placid atmosphere, the barely audible hum of water baths that run 24 hours a day. This is serious cooking and not Rice a Roni boil in a bag. This class will cover the basics of sous vide from the equipment used to the science involved and you will learn how to institute sous vide cooking in your kitchen for minimal expense, how to use it safely and experience food that is artfully prepared using the optimal cooking method. We will make the 45 minute egg, perfectly rare steak and tuna and sample shortribs that have slow cooked for 72 hours.
Understanding Molecular Gastronomy
Molecular gastronomy is a term that most are now familiar with, but have only a vague notion of. In this class we will discuss the genre then prepare and work with some of the components and equipment that form the backbone of this style of cooking, By making spheres, gels, foams, sheets and emulsifications, participants will get a better understanding of the science behind the art.
Vegetarian Finger Foods
Having a party and a lot of vegetarians are coming? Don’t want to stick them with the trusty crudite tray and dip while the carnivores have so much more to choose from? Fear not, it is quite easy to prepare an innovative and diverse vegetarian spread that the meat eaters at your bash will be happy to indulge in. Participants will prepare an array of small snacks, artfully presented, that will wow and satisfy. The menu includes:
Seared Tempeh in Ginger Broth
Herbed Goat Cheese Stuffed Snow Peas
Eggplant Caviar Canapés
Onion fritters with Cucumber Banana Raita
Gougéres (French Cheese Puffs)
Roasted Mushrooms Filled with Duxelles
Curried Potato Samosas
Winter Soups and Stews
Whether you have been on the slopes all day or in an office wishing you were, this is the time of year that when hunger strikes, we all yearn for a steaming bowl of soup or a hearty stew. In this class you will learn to make homemade cream of tomato soup, roasted squash, apple and coconut soup, lamb barley stew and a classic French cassoulet. We’ll discuss homemade stocks and how to shortcut them for best results.
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