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Spend your vacation in the kitchen? Destination cooking schools make it fun

Dinner guests have been known to ask me for the recipe for Casserole Ole, my signature dish, so easy with its many canned ingredients. And my sister-in-law swears I can make a name for myself by publishing Bachelor's Ways with Broccoli. In other words, I'm not a bad cook--just one set in his ways. So it was in an effort to break out of my culinary rut that I signed up for California-Asian Weekend at Tante Marie's Cooking School in San Francisco.

Run for 21 years by Mary Risley, Tante Marie's is one of the West's growing number of destination cooking schools--academies where you can hone your culinary skills in stimulating surroundings. These schools cluster in desirable vacation spots, from San Francisco to Santa Fe. They have hands-on classes for the novice, expert, and intermediate cook (like me), with course lengths ranging from a single day to an entire week. Some schools even branch out to conduct culinary tours of their regions. All of them offer a chance to gain practical cooking expertise and send you home with a batch of recipes and newly honed skills to apply in your own kitchen.

Cuisine 101: Finding the cooking school that's right for you

If you want to base a vacation around becoming a better cook, you'll find an ample number of cooking schools happy to oblige. Aside from geography (you've always wanted to visit New Mexico, you like Mendocino County wines), how do you choose a school? According to Mary Risley, owner-founder of Tante Marie's, the best way is to talk to a former student. "You can't tell if someone is a good teacher by their write-up," says Risley. "Sometimes big-name chefs are not very good teachers."

There are two kinds of cooking classes: demonstration and participation. Risley is a big believer in classes that let students participate. "You learn better by doing it," she says. "After watching a chef, I thought I could bone a duck in 10 minutes; it took me 45. Sometimes in demonstration classes, you can feel that the chef is having all the fun and you're just sitting there." Risley also advises that it's easier to learn in small groups. "Large classes aren't good. If there are more than 35 people in a class, you're just watching a chef prepare food."

Our list focuses on the best-regarded destination cooking schools in the West--schools with regularly scheduled classes, located in prime vacation areas. For a fuller listing of cooking programs across the West (and elsewhere), look to The Guide to Cooking Schools (ShawGuides, New York, 2001; $22.95; 212/799-6464 or www. shawguides.com).

California

Apple Farm. Owned by well-known chef Sally Schmitt, this 30-acre retreat in Mendocino County's Anderson Valley offers weekend cooking classes on the farm for $270 (lodging not included). 18501 Greenwood Rd., Philo; (707) 895-2461.

Art of Thai Cooking. Cookbook author Kasma Loha-unchit offers five-day Thai cooking classes ($450) for cooks of all levels. Box 21165, Oakland; (510) 655-8900 or www.thaifoodandtravel.com.

Cakebread Cellars. This Napa Valley winery offers five one-day participation classes ($155) every year, focusing on food as a complement to wine. 8300 St. Helena Hwy., Rutherford; (707) 963-5221.

California Culinary Academy. Professional culinary school offers Saturday classes for nonprofessionals in the school's kitchens, taught by the school's regular staff. Subjects range from basic kitchen skills to beginning sushi to cooking for a party. $110 for four-hour session. 625 Polk St., San Francisco; (800) 229-2433 or www.baychef.com.

Cooking Schools Melbourne

Corporate Team Cooking classes, a recent innovation in the field of team building rewards, incentives and activities, provides a uniquechallenge and a significant opportunity for organisations and individuals alike.

In our corporate cooking classes participants learn to work together to produce exotic and unfamiliar gourmet meals, using techniques and ingredients entirely new to most. No prior experience necessary. Our corporate cooking classes are for everyone.

For those with little or no cooking experience this can be daunting. For those who think they know how to cook, even more so! It's not about how much you know it's about producing a Team result.

The old adage, "If you can't stand the heat get out of the kitchen" has no place in Team building.

Cooking a gourmet meal requires and builds teamwork. Cooking as a team develops service to others, close cooperation, planning skills, good communication, quality performance, leadership, consensus and attention to detail.

Our cooking classes offer new techniques, ingredients and tools present opportunities for learning and innovation. For both the uninitiated and the experienced cook, it is a challenge requiring full focus, openness to constructive criticism, constant learning, and most importantly, teamwork.

The menus offered are based on the degree of cooking experience of the group, to provide a challenging learning experience, to take the group into new territory, to stretch whatever culinary skills they may have; and to teach the fundamental truth: the team won't get through this unless it works together.

For more cooking school info, visit Find Articles.

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