Cooking Class and Dinner

Back in January I signed up for a 4-day (one day per week) cooking class series in March. It was a pretty big commitment 'cause I had no idea what I would be doing in March and whether a few weeks after I signed up I would still want to dedicate 3 hours for 4 Tuesdays to cooking. The classes were described as "learning how to combine flavours, colours, textures and temperatures for a beautiful and composed plate". They're by a lady who caters and also does packaged-foods to sell at the farmer's market every Saturday. We've had 2 classes so far. It's not as great as I thought it would be, there's only 4 people (guess March is not a popular time?...). One of them is a beginner who is taking the classes to learn to cook for her b-friend, and the other 2 are stay at home Moms who are rich and talk a lot about designing their kitchen and going to the cottage a lot (typical Toronto thing). No offense, they are super nice and friendly. It's a TO thing - people owning cottages and talking about it all the time. Since there's only 4 of us, there are no teams and each person does one recipe, which is not a lot of fun and you don't get to see the other recipes being made.

The first week we made fried panko-breaded avocado with homemade chipotle mayonnaise, french onion soup, rack of lamb, mediterranean couscous, and salty caramel ice cream. I made the avocado (so yummy) and the couscous (not a fan of couscous). The rest was good, except I'm not into lamb and the salty caramel ice cream was good, very different tasting but so much work I doubt I will ever make it. I think the only one I would make again is the soup, when I get around to buying the soup bowls soon. This is my second time eating fried avocado - pretty tasty (it's fried!) and a conversation-starter, but I don't like frying in the house.

The second week, there was only 3 of us, and the menu was sweet-and-sour red cabbage soup, mushroom rarebit, and shrimp and sausage pasta. The first one was good, but again not something I would probably do again at home. The mushroom rarebit is basically toast, sauteed mushrooms and a mixture of cheese+breadcrumbs+mustard+worcestershire on top. I made the shrimp and pasta sausage in class, which has a white wine sauce, garlic, basil and pine nuts. We had it with this special pasta that are tiny little balls (kinda like couscous, but bigger). The last two were good, hence our invite to people for dinner this past Saturday. :) Unfortunately, as expected, my dishes didn't turn out as good as they did in class (maybe I was hungry back then, since we don't eat until about 8?). My mushroom rarebit turned out really salty, maybe the result of using just cheddar instead of gruyère+cheddar and trying to make my own breadcrumbs with leftover bread (which just added so much unnecessary work to my day...). The pasta I made with fresh fussilli pasta. I forgot to salt, but it was just ok. We also had asparagus with oil + balsamic, made by T!! (oops, I forgot to take a picture)

The cheese in class melted into almost liquid. Mine stayed stuck, maybe too many coarse breadcrumbs?

Not bad, need some parmesan cheese on top next time!

Two more classes to go. I hope we get to make the stuff the class description said "seared duck breast in a port wine sauce, leek bread pudding, exotic black rice risotto, apple cranberry fruit tart, chocolate cake and more". I doubt it. The lady chef seems to just wing it. But hopefully it'll be something good and yummy I can replicate at home!