The night after lesson one, I turned up for lesson six; this time, we were learning how to cook seafood. A different crowd attended this lesson; they knew each other from some of the other lessons, they were more relaxed in the kitchen, and they talked more: it seems like there had been quite a transformation from the kinds of people I shared lesson one with the previous evening.
First up, we watched a vanilla panna cotta (cooked cream – a dessert kel has made a number of times) be prepared, and then fast-tracked into the fridge to set: tips for young players, if you grease the container with some vegetable oil, it’s much easier to remove the panna cotta from the container at the other end of the chilling process.
Next, we learned how to prepare scallops as shown below:
This involved some work with a mortar and pestle, and then cooking under a grill. The only trouble with this entree is that it’s not terribly filling. This is something that the main course of clam chowder more than made up for. Another tip: if you don’t want to use enough clams to feed a bunch of adults, you can flesh out the chowder with some white fish.
I think I’ll leave it there: I don’t want to give away all my cooking secrets. I would certainly recommend the he cooks course to any guy who wants to learn more about cooking impressive-looking meals for guests, and to gain some more confidence in the kitchen at the same time.