Last Week in the Kitchen

WE HOSTED several corporate events who all chose Spanish and Italian menus.

WE COOKED delicious dim sum and pastry chef Maddy made sponge biscuits for tiramisu, aided by Louisa, our work experience student who has joined us as part of her school programme.

WE LEARNT that snake beans and long beans are the same thing. We bought them from two different shops and found that they were same ingredient in both cases!

WE ATE leftover tiramisu that had been made on the Italian corporate events and beautiful freshly baked brioche for breakfast.

We’ve got a host of courses over the summer months from Intermediate and our Teen Cooking Camp, as well as classes including, Meat, The ultimate fish and shellfish, Pastry and A Vegan Summer.

The lowdown from our Cook’s Certificate

Our keen Cook’s Certificate students are a month into the Food and Wine Programme that will take them from novices in the kitchen to cooks with the knowledge, skills and confidence to go into a career in food, be it small-scale catering, yacht or chalet cooking or work in professional kitchens.

At this stage the students have covered all the main topics required to be a decent chef including, salads, soups, stews, roasts, pastry making – short crust, pate sucre, choux, puff, croissant dough – eggs, gelatins and mousses, breads, sourdough baking and chocolate making! Not only that, they’ve covered regional cuisines: Italian pasta, gnocchi and risotto, Mexican, Thai, Dimsum, Middle Eastern and Spanish. The final 2 weeks will include the WSET Level 2 wine course, a session on cooking to a budget, a tour of the food shops of Soho, a visit to La Fromagerie to learn about cheese and a group task cooking up a feast for the entire Cookery School team and themselves to enjoy!

The Cook’s Certificate in Food and Wine takes place three times a year – spring, summer and autumn with the course next starting on Monday 11th September.

Other classes and courses to explore

Our 4 day Ultimate Baking course covers everything from choux and shortcrust, to flatbread and focaccia, to palmiers and a Provencal tart!

Our next 5 day Crash Course in Learning to Cook kicks off in early September: 25 hours of teaching across a week with breakfast each day. Take your dishes home along with a repertoire of recipes to recreate for friends and family.

Today (7th July) is World Chocolate Day! Did you know that we host a chocolate masterclass with chocolatier Paul Young? This is usually a team day for corporate clients but if you have an event to organise for friends, family or colleagues then get in touch to find out more about tempering chocolate, mastering ganache and whipping up a silky smooth caramel with Paul.

NHS staff get 20% off classes and courses at Cookery School

It’s the 75th Birthday of the NHS and to mark this occasion and to thank the NHS staff for all of the amazing work they do, we would like to offer a 20% discount off our classes and courses (excl Dan Lepard’s Sourdough Masterclass & the Cook’s Certificate). To receive the discount, simply email us with your NHS email before booking your class and we will send a special discount code to you.

Strawberry Tart Recipe

Saving the best to last, with Wimbledon and Strawberry season firmly upon us, why not make our fabulous strawberry tart?

Conversations around the table

Do kids need special food? Sheila Dillon looks at how food habits are formed by young children on the Food Programme.

Groundswell Festival (the Glastonbury of farming) took place last week. With a focus on regenerative agriculture topics this year included regenerative viticulture, diet of the future and regenerative vegetable and compost production. More about SOIL here!