Cooking up a Storm…

So the mental weather continues and last Wednesday I managed to get caught in a rain storm whilst en route to Clapham Junction.

The reason I was daring to head saaaaaf of the river was to participate in a Jamie Oliver cooking class at his shop cum deli cum cookery school, Recipease which I’d booked as a birthday surprise for my feller. You might think this a horrible, girlfriend thing to do but he actually loves food and cooking so honestly it was a present well received.

I mean what present wouldn’t be well received when it’s revealed on a HAND WRITTEN apron. Creative genius you say? Oh shucks.

Anyway running my usual 10 minutes late, despite having boyfriend in tow AND his new watch (yes this lesson was his final birthday treat) we hot footed it from the station, round the corner and spotted the bright pink shop front of Recipease.

Totally not what I was expecting. Nor was I expecting the class to take place in the MIDDLE of the shop. I thought I would be able to struggle in the privacy of the back of the class not get laughed at by every Jamie, Gordon and Nigella that decided to pop in and browse for quinoa (keeeenwaaar – I know y’all are struggling to pronounce that) but no; apparently not being able to cook is nothing to be ashamed of.

Once aproned up (no my man did not wear his custom-made design, boo!) we gathered round to listen to Lee. That’s right, Lee and before you ask no Jamie has not changed his name. After getting over the initial shock that there would be no naked chef telling me my pasta was pukka and over-using the olive oil, we listened to an actually rather helpful and lovely Lee as he explained the first steps of how to make home-made ravioli.

It turns out you make it with great difficulty if you are me.

The whole class took two hours and was good clean messy fun. There were the obvious teachers pet who, already owned their own pasta-maker at home, had participated in the previous ‘Knife cutting skills’ class and had rolled out 10 perfectly square spinach and ricotta ravioli shapes before I had even washed my hands at the sink! But still the class was enjoyable with the recipe easy(ish) to follow, simple(ish) to make and it also provided a nice healthy, bit of competition for me and Mr. Head Chef.

Once cooked, seasoned and served we all sat down with glass of wine in hand to tuck into our creations.

Mine was…hmmm…well, lets just say I won’t be penning my own cook book any time soon. The feller’s, however, was something short of amazing!! So much so I suggested we “try each others” more than a few times. Oh well, he shall be left to whip up a storm in the kitchen whilst I busy myself with other important things… on-line shopping, tasting the wine, designing more aprons etc, etc…  

Classes start from £30.00 and they do everything from pasta to Mexican food. Personally, if like me your strengths lie outside the kitchen, something as fiddly as ravioli making may not be for you.

http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipease/index.html