Autumn 2008
Vermont Eats: Back to School
Forget the No. 2 Ticonderogas, sharpen your chef's knife instead
By Marialisa Calta
Photographed by Caleb Kenna
If you're a home cook — or just interested in becoming a home cook — it's easy to find cooking schools or courses that will help you hone your skills. Some local choices:
- The New England Culinary Institute offers a wide assortment of hands-on classes through the Inn at Essex, including a three-day intensive "Culinary Boot Camp" that teaches the basics of everything from knife handling to roasting, salad dressings and pies. There are also more advanced short courses in ethnic cuisines, seasonal cooking and the like. Seven hundred full-time students attend NECI each year, earning a variety of degrees and certificates, including a Bachelor's or Associate's, and an additional 1,500 "civilians" take the short, hands-on cooking courses. www.vtculinaryresort.com; (802) 878-1100
- You'll be punching down your dough and punching up your repertoire while taking classes at the Baking Education Center at King Arthur Flour in Norwich. The fall roster includes lots of bread classes (try "Baking Artisans Bread" on Nov. 7) as well as the "mmmmm"-inducing "Hearty Stews and Breads," with award-winning, Winooski-based cookbook author Molly Stevens (Sept. 27 and 28). www.kingarthurflour.com; (800) 652-3334
- If your idea of a cooking instructor involves someone with a French accent, Provence-born chef Robert Barral fills the bill. Barral teaches soups, sauces, cassoulet and myriad other dishes to a small group nearly every Monday afternoon at his acclaimed restaurant, Café Provence, in Brandon. "From the beginning, when I opened this place, I planned to teach," says Barral, who taught at NECI for 15 years. "I could not imagine not teaching, not sharing. We share all the time in the kitchen." When enrollment is small, students take over the restaurant's open kitchen and roll up their sleeves; when enrollment is large, they watch the chef demonstrate. "She had to drag me here kicking and screaming," said Brian Billings of Rutland, nodding toward his mother, Maryanne, as the two sampled lobster thermidor at a recent class. "Now I can't wait to come back." Barral offers a popular menu of kids' cooking classes too. www.cafeprovencevt.com; (802) 247-9997
- "Sustainability" is the subtext of all the cooking classes at Mary's Restaurant at the Inn at Baldwin Creek in Bristol, where Chef Doug Mack offers half-day, hands-on courses. Mack first takes his students — 8 to 12 in a class — out to the restaurant's greenhouse where they learn the "why" and "how" of growing their own produce year around. Then, after snipping greens and harvesting produce, students head to a makeshift kitchen in one of the inn's rooms. The classes are varied and the menu, global — several recent classes included "Bold Flavors of Spain," "French Bistro" and "Island Cuisine: Caribbean Classics." Mack says many who take the course are guests at the inn, but "we [also] have lots of local, repeat people." www.baldwincreekinn.com; (888) 424-2432
- Gretchen Saries and Greg Labarthe tempt the palate with a veritable feast of offerings, all taught in the spacious and inviting catering kitchen in their 19th-century farmhouse in Worcester. The duo, who own Bon Temps Gourmet Catering, will let you tour the world with classes on "Tapas, Mezze and Antipasto" (the Spanish, Greek and Italian version of hors d'oeuvres), Chinese dim sum, fresh pastas, Italian casseroles and the like. They also give tours of the markets and neighborhoods of Montreal and have even offered cooking lessons as an "activity" at catered events. www.bontempsgourmet.com; (802) 223-0236
- Fayston caterer Lisa Friedman of The Wooden Spoon offers classes once a month at the licensed commercial kitchen in her home. The classes, for groups of eight, explore a variety of culinary themes such as "Serious Chocolate," "Taste of Thai," "Holiday Hors d'oeuvres." They are held from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., followed by dinner, which becomes quite social — thanks to the wine and the fact many of the attendees are friends or "repeats." Friedman says her most popular course may be "Weeknight Dinners," in which the students learn to make "really tasty food that the kids will enjoy." Occasionally, Friedman says, she will hit the road to offer culinary classes at other people's homes. www.woodenspoon-vt.com; (802) 496-9713
- Ellen Ogden, co-founder of The Cook's Garden seed company (formerly in Vermont, now in Pennsylvania) offers occasional and by-request classes in "Cooking From the Garden." The classes are offered in her home in Manchester Village and emphasize simple but elegant preparations of fresh garden produce. www.ellenogden.com; (802) 362-3931
- This fall, The Kitchen Store in Waitsfield brings a "Soiree at the Store" series of celebratory classes filled with music, techniques, wine pairings and discussions, and often a special guest who can teach to the topic. At least three evenings this fall are dedicated to wild game, foods of Normandy and Spanish tapas. www.vermontstore.com; (802) 496-4465
Eat & Sleep
Inns around Vermont offer packages that include culinary classes not open to the general public.
Go to: www.VermontLife.com for listings.
THE INSIDE SCOOP
- It's not just because Jessica Turner worked for Vermont Life that we are cheering her new Montpelier store, Capital Kitchen. It's also because now we don't have to drive for miles for an apple peeler or a turkey roaster, or those cool silicone colanders that fold up flat. Hip, hip, hooray! www.capitalkitchenvt.com; (802) 229-2305
- Whether or not you want to "Eat More Kale," you can purchase the logo on bumper stickers and hand-stenciled-in-Vermont T-shirts and onesies at www.eatmorekale.com. Bo Muller-Moore, the Montpelierite behind the logo, also offers animal designs, political humor and — his original design — "CHEESE."
- Calais writer Rowan Jacobsen follows his "A Geography of Oysters" — a 2007 book nominated for a prestigious James Beard Award — with "Fruitless Fall: The Collapse of the Honey Bee and the Coming Agricultural Disaster" due out in September. According to the book's publisher, Bloomsbury USA, the book "emphasizes the miracle of flowering plants and their pollination partners."
- The Mad River Valley is yackety-yakking about the arrival of — you guessed it — yaks, at Steadfast Farm in Waitsfield. According to Rob Williams, who co-owns the business with his wife, Kate, and four other partners, yak meat is high in protein and low in fat, and "more succulent, darker, redder and sweeter than beef." Yak recipes are available at www.vermontyak.com; (802) 279-3364.
