Wickedfood Cooking School, SUNNINGHILL

Information & bookings (011) 234-3252 sunninghill@wickedfood.co.za

Hi all,

The first of the summer vegetables is now coming in to the shops, with asparagus and artichokes leading the way. On the fruit side, strawberries are in full swing, and the first mulberries are starting to appear, together with early peaches and nectarines.  See our recipe of the week for tips on cooking asparagus.

Cooking classes for individuals for the next two weeks include Spanish peasant cooking, Making pasta sauces, Easy Italian and Outdoor cooking, this one concentrating on beef.  See the overview below for all the cooking classes for the next two months.

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Looking for info on food?

If you have any food-related questions, or a dish that you just can’t get right or even a certain recipe that you are looking for, but just can’t seem to find, then contact us and we will do our best to answer it as soon as possible. Click Here for more information. Hope to hear from you soon.

Wickedfood Cooking School news

Cooking class programmes for the next two months are up on the internet, click the relevant month for the October and November programmes.

Wickedfood Cooking School runs cooking classes with a minimum of 8 participants and a maximum of 12 as this gives everyone hands-on experience and keeps the cooking class small enough for maximum learning. These cooking classes are conducted by our senior instructors who have extensive experience in the food industry and share a variety of additional cooking tips throughout the cooking class.

• Sunday 09 October at 4pm – Spanish peasant cooking (R380pp for the class). Learn to cook with the robust flavours of the Spanish countryside in this Spanish cooking class. Spanish food reflects this vast country’s turbulent history, diverse geography and Mediterranean culture. The class includes fried calamari, chourizo and cheese fritters, garlic soup, butterflied lamb, hot chourizo salad, and fried cream.
• Monday 10 October at 6pm – Making pasta sauces (R370pp). Tired of the same old pasta sauces? Come learn some new ones in our pasta cooking class. Delicious, no-fuss, easy sauces for pasta, including raw tomato sauce with ricotta cheese, rocket pesto, vodka tomato cream, ham and mascarpone, and ragù with nuts and mushrooms.
• Monday 17 October at 6pm – Easy to prepare Italian dishes (R380pp). Italian cuisine is noted for its regional diversity, abundance of difference in taste, and is known to be one of the most popular in the world. The main characteristics of Italian cuisine is its extreme simplicity. Dishes and recipes are often the creation of grandmothers rather than of chefs, and this makes many recipes ideally suited for home cooking. This is one of the main reasons behind the ever increasing popularity of this cuisine. Join us in this Italian cooking class for an introduction to Italian cuisine including tomato pizza, bean and pasta soup, cannelloni, grilled fish, bean salad and lemon tart.
• Sunday 23 October at 4pm – Outdoor Cooking – beef class (R395pp). A braai is essentially a traditional way of preparing a meal on the open fire. It has evolved to take on many forms since early pioneering days – from a wood fire to the use of charcoal and gas. Today a variety of BBQ shapes and cooking surfaces allows for exciting and innovative methods of meal preparation. It is unquestionably the most enticing, easy and informal way to entertain. Join us in learning the delicious secrets of cooking beef on kettlebraais and gas barbecues in our Outdoor cooking class. Dishes covered in this class include spicy beef burgers, secrets of cooking the ultimate steak, prime rib roast, and Béarnaise sauce.

On Asparagus

Asparagus is a spring vegetable, and is getting to the height of the season right now.  Enjoy the ones that are grown locally now, while they are abundant on the shelf, at good prices.

Asparagus is a flowering perennial plant in the genus as the lily family. A plant may have a life of up to 20 years if cultivated with care. On the negative side, they make the soil around them sterile, so once they are removed, very little else grows where they were being cultivated.

Earliest records of asparagus cultivation trace it back to Greece some 2,500 years ago. The Greeks believed that asparagus possessed medicinal properties and recommended it as a cure for toothaches.

It is the tender shoots of the asparagus that are harvested. On the shelves you find mainly green and white varieties, and occasionally purple.  They are all the same plant, with the white asparagus growing beneath this soil, whereas the green asparagus is harvested once it is approximately 15 to 20cm above the soil. The colour is thus determined by the amount of exposure to sunlight. The white asparagus variety has less flavour than the green or purple asparagus. They are always harvested by hand, a very labour intensive vegetable. Click here for two simple recipes.

Book of the week

One Magic Square: The Easy, Organic Way to Grow Your Own Food on a  square metre.

Australian gardener, Lolo Houbain’s popular book on creating themed and small 1m2 food gardens, has reached South Africa. Starting with a discussion on the types of food production in the world, she then encourages the reader to start his own small food garden using one of 30 different designs. She also covers how to prepare the beds, composting, pests, and vegetable and herb culture. Finally she has a section on vegetables and herbs that you can plant.

Click Here for reviews of all our cookbook reviews.

Food quote of the week

“Don’t take a butcher’s advice on how to cook meat. If he knew, he’d be a chef.” – Andy Rooney

Recipes of the week:

Asparagus

Asparagus is one of the first spring vegetables to arrive on the shop shelves.  They are now at the height of the season, with prices coming down all the time.  Buy local, the fresher the sweeter.  Here are two simple recipes, one for white and the other for green asparagus, as well as a delicious easy-to-prepare sauce. ….Click Here for all our recipes.

Wickedfood Cooking School runs cooking classes throughout the year at its purpose-built Johannesburg cooking studio. Cookery classes are run in the mornings and evenings 7 days a week (subject to a minimum of 12 people). The venue is also popular for corporate events and private functions – teambuilding cooking classes, birthdays, kitchen teas, and dinner parties with a difference.

Our cooking lessons are hands-on, where every person gets to participate in the preparation of the dishes. They are also a lot of fun where you not only learn new skills, but get to meet people with similar interests. For corporate groups and team building cooking classes these events are a novel way of creating staff interaction or entertaining clients.