From watching cooking shows on the television, to reading travel articles in the newspaper, to walking into the local Asian or Mexican bakery or grocery, there is always something to learn. Food is central to all cultures, it brings families together, brings friends and lovers together– food is a medium of expression best shared with others.
Taking local cooking classes is a great way to learn how to cook amazing food and, at its best, learn about the way others live. There are many great wine and food regions in France, it may be about seafood, or it may be about couchon, or it may be sweet wines, or it may be about cheese, or it may be about all of those things. The Provence region of France encapsulates all of these– from the coastal village like Cassis and La Ciotat and large cities like Marseille, to inland villages and town like Avignon, Nimes, Arles, and Aix (pronounced ‘X’).
A good cooking class, is like a gumbo, where people with different experiences, with different knowledge, from different places come together to share and blend together to create a beautiful experience. Lisa and I participated in two of these in Aix-en-Provence. The most recent was with Tesse at her lovely home a little outside of Aix (http://tessa-cooking.fr/). Tesse is in her late 60s, early 70s and is one of those whirl-wind people who have so much knowledge and such big heart that they can do nothing less than share everything they know with you. When you tell her something or ask her something, she is in the moment with you, focused on you and the dance of sharing.
Lisa, I, and a wonderful Japanese woman, named, “Shoshi” were the students. Usually, Tesse’s classes begin with a trip to the market, but all of us had been to the market many times already, so we all jumped straight into the kitchen. Shoshi brought her own knife from Japan…gotta love it.
The meal we worked on was sundried tomatoe caviar, salad, pistou soup ( a very popular summer soup in Provence lots of different beans, zucchini, carrots, tomatoes and a sauce with lots of basil and garlic and mountain ham ), and lavender crème brulée. First we started the crème brulée since it would need to be ‘infused’ with Lavender and Vanilla for an hour and then must bake at a low temperature of 150f for about 45 minutes. You can make it a couple of days in advance and then torch the top before serving. You can see Lisa and Douglas working the torch in the photos.
Once the infusing was going on, we headed to Tesse’s outdoor kitchen to prep the ingredients for the pistou soup. Pistou is somewhat similar to pesto. Having four people working on the prep came in really handy. It is so strange that in the USA, we treat dinner at a friend’s house or a family member’s house like going to a restaurant. The host(s) is supposed to do all this work by themselves and then the guest shows up for a cocktail, then to eat, then maybe an after dinner drink and then depart. We think it would be much better for everyone if we worked together in creating a meal together and celebrating it by eating together and cleaning up afterwards together. Any way, off that soap box for now. Tesse’s husband joined us for dinner and was delightful.
The other cooking class we went to was with Gilles at http://www.provence-gourmet.fr/en/provence-cooking-class/. His class was much larger with about 7 students. We met at the tourist information center and then went through the market with Gilles leading and explaining. We found out, in his opinion, the best butcher shoppe, the best bread shoppe (http://farinomanfou.fr/).
After the market, we stopped by a winery to pickup 3 bottles (a white, a rose, and a rouge (red)) to go with our meal. TIP: The French only drink wine with food. And in Provence, a local, dry Rose in the spring and summer, is the wine of choice.
With Gilles, we made a couple of different tapenades, a rack of lamb using a mixture of butter and anchovy paste, miniature garlic potatoes, vegetable casserole (in French, vegetables are called legumes) and apricot tart dessert. Since there were so many of us, we didn’t get to do everything first hand. It was a good group and Gilles did a good job. We learned a lot from him and from our other students. In Provence, more olive oil is used than in a lot of the other regions of France…some might say to excess! We assume this is because of the more arid landscape and being along the Mediterranean.
By-the-way, the holy ‘trinity+’ of Provence spices are: savory, marjoram, rosemary, thyme, oregano, and sometimes lavender.
