Cooking Basics 101 concludes on March 25; Japanese Dinners – Oyako Donburi

Post Date: 21 March 2017

 

Happy Spring!  I am looking forward to getting my herb garden started for this year, maybe with some vegetables too, like tomatoes and peppers.  I already have some basil started in the kitchen.

 

Cooking Basics 101 at Lake Braddock continues This Weekend

 

                                                                   
                                                         Lemon Olive Oil Pound Cakes

The third and final session of this class meets this Saturday morning, March 25, at 10:00 AM.  This week we will be making heavy use of the oven.  We will start off by baking a Lemon Olive Oil Pound Cake.  Our vegetable dish will be Roasted Lemon Thyme Carrots and the main course will be Salisbury Steaks.  We will start these in a skillet, then finish them in the oven while using the pan to make a reduction sauce with onions.

Japanese Dinner – Oyako Donburi

                                                              

                                                           Oyako Donburi

 

This dish is from the cookbook My Japanese Table by Debra Samuels (Tuttle Publishing, Tokyo).  What is interesting about it is the way it is prepared – each of the three main ingredients, ground beef, scrambled eggs, and green vegetables (in this case, asparagus) are prepared sequentially in the same skillet.  First comes the beef, then the scrambled eggs, then the vegetable, wiping the pan clean with a paper towel after each iteration.  The trick is to keep the first 2 dishes warm while going through the sequence.  The entire dish is served on a bed of rice, cooked separately.  Sugar is a big ingredient here, being add to both the beef and the eggs.  The beef also has Mirin, a sweet sake, added, so it tends to be a bit sweet. Next time I make this I will leave out the sugar in the meat and just do the mirin.

Reminder – Instagam

Follow me on Instagram at #senseichef.  I look forward to your comments on my posts, culinary and otherwise.

 

Upcoming Classes

Here are my classes for the spring term. 

April 8, 22, and 29 – Saturday Morning – Cooking Basics 101 – Lake Braddock Secondary School

May 4 – Thursday Evening – Introduction to Middle Eastern Cooking – Plum Center

 

May 31 – Wednesday Evening – Stuffed Jumbo Shells – Plum Center

 

June 3 – Saturday Morning – Beach House Brunch v2.0 – Plum Center

 

To register for this class, or any ACE cooking classes, please go to:

 

http://www.fcps.edu/is/ace/

 

While there, be sure to check out the other culinary courses offered by ACE’s excellent chef instructors.

 

Till next time, keep cooking.

 

Contact Chef Kevin at: KJBrady@fcps.edu                          

 

 

 

 

Cooking Basics 101 continues on March 18; Japanese Dinners; Orange Cake

Post Date: 16 March 2017

I hope everyone got through the blizzard of 2017 in good shape.  I guess it was too much to expect to get through the winter completely unscathed by weather.  I have been trying some more Japanese recipes, two of which are discussed below.

Cooking Basics 101 at Lake Braddock continues This Weekend

 

                                                           

                                                         Baked Salmon

 

The second session of this class meets this Saturday morning, March 18, at 10:00 AM.  We will be making a French Vinaigrette with Salad Greens, Baked Salmon with Mustard and Panko Bread Crumbs, and a no bake dessert with Strawberries and Marscapone Cheese.  We will also be discussing how long to keep spices, different types of salt, and what really makes a vinaigrette. 

 

 

Japanese Dinners

 

 

Beef Teriyaki

I have been continuing my foray into Japanese cuisine with recipes from the NHK website, Japanese Public Broadcasting.  I recently made 2 beef recipes, a Beef Teriyaki and a Beef and Tomato Curry.  In both of them I went a little outside the box and served them on top of quinoa instead of rice.  For the Teriyaki, I used stew meat and cut the cubes up into smaller pieces.  For the Curry, I used ground beef.

 

 

                                                              Beef Curry

 

For the Curry (pictured above), I cooked the broccoli for 4 minutes in boiling water, then immersed them in an ice bath while the curry was prepared.  At the end I added the broccoli to the skillet to finish them off.  Their vibrant green color also helped make a nice presentation of the dish.  I hope to offer a Japanese cooking class on the A.C.E. calendar in the upcoming fall or winter terms.

Here is the link to the NHK website’s food section:

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/food/

 

 

Orange Cake

 

This is truly a wonderful and delicious cake.  I learned to make it from Chef Patrice Olivon’s online cooking show, Cooking Live. (www.cooking-live.com). Pictured above is the cake when it came out of the oven.  I put confectioner’s sugar on when serving.  The recipe calls for 14 tablespoons of butter (yes, that is not a typo), 1 ¾ cups of confectioner’s sugar in the batter, 3 eggs, and the juice of 2 oranges as the main ingredients.  I am considering making this cake as the dessert in the third session of my current Cooking Basics 101 class on March 25.

Reminder – Instagam

Follow me on Instagram at #senseichef.  I look forward to your comments on my posts, culinary and otherwise.

 

Upcoming Classes

Here are my classes for the spring term. 

April 8, 22, and 29 – Saturday Morning – Cooking Basics 101 – Lake Braddock Secondary School

May 4 – Thursday Evening – Introduction to Middle Eastern Cooking – Plum Center

May 31 – Wednesday Evening – Stuffed Jumbo Shells – Plum Center

June 3 – Saturday Morning – Beach House Brunch v2.0 – Plum Center

To register for this class, or any ACE cooking classes, please go to:

http://www.fcps.edu/is/ace/

While there, be sure to check out the other culinary courses offered by ACE’s excellent chef instructors.

Till next time, keep cooking.

Contact Chef Kevin at: KJBrady@fcps.edu                          

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dinner in Normandy Class concludes; Cooking Basics 101 begins on March 4; Roasted Broccoli and Pasta.

Post Date: 1 March 2017

A.C.E Dinner in Normandy Class Concludes

                         
                                                               Chicken Normandy

                                                          
                                                                        Apple Tart

We had 11 participants for this 1 session class that met last Saturday morning and made 5 fun dishes: Baked Camembert with Apples, French Vinaigrette with Salad Greens, Chicken Normandy, a Vegetable Medley, and an Apple Tart.  Pictured above are the Chicken Normandy and the Tart made in the class by the students.


Cooking Basics 101 at Lake Braddock begins This Weekend

This 3 session class begins this Saturday morning at 10:00 AM at Lake Braddock Secondary School.  In our first session we will be making a Caprese Salad, Blanched Broccoli, Pan Fried Chicken Italiano, and a Blueberry Ricotta Parfait for our dessert.  We will also be discussing knife skills and safe food handling techniques.

Roasted Broccoli and Pasta Dinner

 

 

I made this recipe last night; it was in last Wednesday’s New York Times Cooking section and it is a delicious dish.  The link to the recipe is below. The Broccoli is roasted while the pasta (I used Rigatoni) is cooked to almost al dente, then added to the roasting pan with the Broccoli and topped with Ricotta and a Panko/Parmesan/Lemon Zest Mixture. The pan is then put back in the oven under the broiler for a few minutes and drizzled with Lemon Juice before serving.

 

https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1018580-spicy-roasted-broccoli-pasta

 

 

 

Reminder – Instagam

 

Follow me on Instagram at #senseichef.  I look forward to your comments on my posts, culinary and otherwise.

 

Upcoming Classes

 

Here are my classes for the rest of the winter term.  Spring catalogue will be out soon.

 

March 10 – Friday Evening – Introduction to Middle Eastern Cooking – Plum Center

 

To register for this class, or any ACE cooking classes, please go to:

 

http://www.fcps.edu/is/ace/specialinterest.shtml and scroll down to the Culinary section

 

While there, be sure to check out the other culinary courses offered by ACE’s excellent chef instructors.

 

Till next time, keep cooking.

 

Contact Chef Kevin at: KJBrady@fcps.edu