We Love
We love finding people, products, places and initiatives that celebrate similar ideas to us. From our favourite food shops in London to chef spotlights, it’s everything we love about about food, cooking and sustainability.
RECIPE: Green Garlic Souffle
At Cookery School we bust the myth that soufflés are tricky. The secret is to make a good, smooth béchamel – a simple béchamel sauce made with flour, milk, butter or oil is the basis for any soufflé.
During spring time both wild garlic (leaves) and green garlic (a young garlic bulb) are in abundance and make a beautiful and delicate flavoured spring soufflé.
World Chocolate Week
It’s World Chocolate Week which means we can discuss one of our favourite topics. At Cookery School we have one huge proviso when it comes to chocolate – it has to be 100% slave free. Sadly this is still a major issue for many chocolate brands and is why the chocolate that we use at Cookery School is always ethical.
Our favourite chocolate is Original Beans.
Top 16 Classic Cookery Books
Reading recommendations
Whether you are dabbling with the idea of upping your cookery game at home, or planning a career as a chef by taking our Cook’s Certificate, Rosalind, Cookery School’s founder, has pulled together a list of essential Cookery School reading. In fact, her Top 16 Classic Cookery Books for you to peruse and enjoy.
Rosalind writes:
I have thought long and hard about this.
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Cook's Certificate Recipes We Love
Events: Les Dames d’Escoffier
This week we hosted an evening for Les Dames d’Escoffier, a leadership culinary organisation made up of successful women in the food industry who have also contributed to their local communities. Founded in New York City in the 1970s, we were hosts to the London chapter of Les Dames d’Escoffier for the first time, since our founder, Rosalind, joined the organisation as a new Dame earlier this year!
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Corporate Newsletters We Love
Supplier Spotlight: Q&A with Vintage Roots
At Cookery School we buy our wines from Vintage Roots, a certified organic wine supplier who have supported and promoted organic viticulture since starting the business in 1986. We opened our account with Vintage Roots in 2004 and have enjoyed almost 20 years of working together and seeing organic wines really take to the stage.
With organic wine consumption steadily increasing year-on-year we spoke to Vintage Roots founder and director,
Baking and Breaking Bread with Dan Lepard
We always love to welcome one of the most respected authorities on baking, Dan Lepard, into Cookery School. His sourdough baking classes with us remain extremely popular thanks not only to Dan’s extensive knowledge, but also to the style of his teaching.
We caught up with Dan to find out some of the secrets to his success, what he feels are some of the trends within bread making and why he enjoys teaching here at Cookery School…
Q:What are some of the most surprising things you have learnt from teaching people how to bake bread?
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Uncategorized We Love
Cook’s Certificate Graduate Profile: Meet refugee Faraj Alnasser
Guest post by Ali Clifford, sustainability communications consultant at incredibusy.com. The theme of this year’s Refugee Week 2024 is “Our Home”
Ali writes:
“I chatted recently to one of Cookery School at Little Portland Street, London’s favourite Cook’s Certificate graduates Faraj Alnasser. Faraj completed their intensive six week course ‘Cook’s Certificate in Food and Wine’ with flying colours and is now running his own food business in Cambridge.
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We Love
Looking after your Gut Health – Interview with Jeannette Hyde
Jeannette Hyde is a London-based practising Registered Nutritional Therapist (BSc mBANT, CNHC) who specialises in helping people improve their gut health. She leads a very popular class with us at Cookery School on eating deliciously for a healthy gut, and the foods and meals that can help us get there.
We caught up with Jeannette to discover the importance of maintaining a healthy gut and how you can do this during lockdown.
RECIPE: Bakewell Tart
Searching for the perfect Bakewell Tart recipe? Originating from the Bakewell pudding, the Bakewell tart is an English dessert made with shortcrust pastry, jam, frangipane (a sweet filling made with almonds), and a topping of flaked almonds. The pudding was, like many fantastic recipes, a happy accident, made by a cook in the town of Bakewell in Derbyshire in the 1860s.
BAKEWELL TART
Pastry
10 ozs/250g flour
7 ozs/175g butter
2 ozs/50g caster sugar
½ level teaspoon baking powder
pinch salt
2 egg yolks
Filling
6 ozs/150g of good strawberry jam
4 ozs/100g butter
4 ozs/100g sugar
4 ozs/100g ground almonds if desired
4 eggs
handful flaked almonds to sprinkle over top
METHOD
1.
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Recipes Uncategorized We Love
Turn Back The Clock – How lessons from the past can help our future
It’s time to turn back the clock! We have been wondering about the past at Cookery School, as many of you who follow us on social media, loved this photo from the 1960’s of our founder Rosalind Rathouse, outside of Sainsbury’s with her husband proudly carrying sturdy paper bags. Those were the days when plastic bags and plastic packaging were not an issue.
Kitchen Storage
If we turn back the clock fifty years people managed in kitchens without products like cling film.
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Sustainability We Love
Cooking with kids is the best recipe – build confidence, skills and have fun!
Our top reasons why kids should be cooking from an early age
Plus, a family friendly recipe with lots of tasks for the little ones to do!
Build Skills
Reading, counting, measuring, shaping, timing, to name a few – there are so many skills that can be developed in cookery, from simple recipes to more complex dishes for the ambitious mini Mary Berry at home! It may start off a little messy but kids will learn lifelong skills,
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Recipes Sustainability We Love
Choose ethical chocolate this Christmas!
At Christmas time, when we’re all thinking about chocolate, we wanted to mention that we’re full of beans about ethical chocolate!
Chocolate, which most of us take for granted, often has a slightly bitter aftertaste, not because it’s 85% cocoa but because the industry is a complex global supply chain which often results in cocoa farmers, particularly children, losing out. Chocolate is a luxury and we should be able to pay fairly for such a delicious treat.
Humans of Hospitality meets Cookery School
Humans of Hospitality is a podcast by people for people. It was founded by Mark Cribb, a wonderful hotelier and restaurateur who believes passionately in the true meaning of hospitality, defined as the friendly and generous reception and entertainment of guests, visitors, or strangers. Not, as Mark says, ‘a balance sheet and a board of directors in a venture capitalist firm in the city.’
With common ground in our approach to people and local communities –
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Sustainability We Love
Chef Spotlight: Chantal Coady OBE
We’re so excited to be welcoming the mother of English chocolate to the Cookery School kitchens this Christmas for an exclusive chocolate class! Chantal Coady established Rococo Chocolates nearly 40 years ago and since then, had led The Real Chocolate Revolution from the front. She’s done so much for the industry that she was awarded an OBE for services to chocolate!
We sat down with Chantal Coady to find out what excites her most about chocolate and received a sneak peek of the tips she’ll be revealing at our Christmas Chocolate Masterclass on December 3.
We’re hiring!
We are hiring energetic back of house staff to wash up, clean and clear dishes, amongst other kitchen porter responsibilities. You must have a good level of spoken English as you will be interacting with customers.
With the busy Christmas season ahead, we’re looking for additional assistance in our Oxford Circus kitchen!
The pay is £12 per hour. Daytime and evening shifts available. There is potential for up to 20 hours per week for the right person.
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We Love
Chef Spotlight: Freddy Gangemi
Our fantastic team of chefs are the experts in all things cookery, leading the majority of our diverse classes. However, every now and then, we welcome a guest chef to share their specialist knowledge far and wide. Just one of these is Freddy Gangemi, an Italian native that leads our Roman and Sicilian classes. We sat down with Freddy to find out what he loves about cooking and the special draw to Italian flavours.
Can you tell me a little about your culinary journey?
The BIG launch: The Cookery School Handbook
To celebrate The Cookery School Handbook launch we invited our nearest and dearest to come along and enjoy an evening of chopping, stirring, cooking and of course – eating! Our cherished suppliers and much loved supporters gathered in our kitchen on Little Portland Street where we collectively created dishes from the Handbook.
It was full on as we had people making choux pastry, others making aioli, potato fritters and then cupcakes and apple pie for dessert.
The Cookery School Handbook is out now!
We’re so excited to have launched our Cookery School Handbook produced and written by our principal, Rosalind Rathouse.
With eleven chapters and not a photograph throughout, the new Cookery School Handbook has been produced with true cooks in mind. It is not designed as a coffee table book but instead hails recipes which convey key methods for original cooking including chapters on sauces, soups, baking, pastry, Sunday roasts amongst others. Whether a beginner or a professional,
TripAdvisor Certificate of Excellence
We are thrilled to announce that we have received a TripAdvisor Certificate of Excellence! Certificates of Excellence are awarded once a year to businesses that consistently receive four and five star reviews from visitors so were delighted to have all our hard work formally recognised.
TripAdvisor reviews are immensely important to a small business like ours as lots of people book based on these reviews. We work so hard to keep high standards and every time we receive a lovely comment from a student,
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We Love
Our top food shops in London
On Monday our Summer Cooking Camp kicks off. This is a five day course aimed at teens to prepare them for when they fly the nest. Whilst mornings are spent cooking, afternoons are spent exploring our favourite London foodie hotspots. Here’s where we’re going next week…
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We Love
An interview with Kumud Shah
Kumud Shah has been running our popular Indian Masterclasses here at Cookery School for a number of years and, more recently, we have added South Indian classes to the mix. Here, we ask Kumud a few questions about herself.
Tell us a bit about your background/where are you from?
I was born in Mumbai,
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We Love
Alternative Father’s Day gifts
The best alternative Father’s Day gifts
Ah, the never-ending question…what to buy for the dad who has everything?!
For something that lasts longer than chocolate, perhaps even longer than socks, why not give him a skill for life – cooking? You can either book him on to a specific class or buy a gift voucher so he can book himself on a course of his choosing.
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We Love
An interview with Dan Lepard
Dan Lepard is one of the world’s most respected authorities on baking and we are fortunate enough to have him teach our sourdough classes here at Cookery School.
Aside from teaching, Dan is also an award-winning food writer and photographer and was a judge on The Great Australian Bake Off, series 1.
We asked him a few questions…
Q:What is it about baking,
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We Love
British Food Fortnight, 21 Sept – 6 Oct
From the 21 September to 6 October we will be celebrating British Food Fortnight
Described as a modern day harvest festival BFF invites communities, businesses and individuals to celebrate the fantastic seasonal produce that is being grown, harvested, cooked and enjoyed!
Love British Food offers some top suggestions on how to get involved from growing food,
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Sustainability We Love
London’s Best Banger results are in…
We were thrilled to have recently been involved with London’s best local sausage competition, hosted by Jellied Eel Magazine. It was a top event that really does highlight just how many London butchers and producers are hard at work across the capital. Now, the results are in. Here’s the press release from Jellied Eel:
Over the past three months, The Jellied Eel magazine, together with London Farmers’ Markets,
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Ingredients We Love
Welcome to Butler School
CNN’s Jim Boulden came to Cookery School to meet the people learning the art of being a butler. The result is this fascinating video about butler training, with a few snippets of wisdom from our own Rosalind Rathouse.
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We Love
We’ve Joined Slow Food UK!
We’re thrilled to announce that we’ve joined the Slow Food UK supporters’ scheme. More news coming soon about this new and exciting collaboration, but needless to say, we’re very much looking forward to working with them.
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We Love
Kitchen Culture: Meet Marcela Moukacher
We have such a wonderful mix of people working with us at Cookery School, people from all different backgrounds, cultures and walks of life. We thought we’d showcase a bit of our diversity here on the blog in a series of interviews. Today we’d like you to meet Marcela Moukacher, Cookery School’s kitchen manager.
Where are you from originally?
I’m from Campo Grande MS in Brazil.
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We Love
Saying goodbye to Rosalind’s Kitchen
We’d like to give you the news that Rosalind’s Kitchen will close up shop on Wednesday 9th May.
It has been an enjoyable year for us, extending the Cookery School ethos to Rosalind’s Kitchen and sharing our love of food with the local community.
There are many exciting things on the horizon for us. To name a few: our ongoing sustainability work,
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We Love
