Cooking at the Cottage:
Think Julia Child in St. Matthews
by Tom James, MD
In the heart of St. Matthews there is a special culinary experience. Cooking at the Cottage( www. cookingatthecottage. com) proclaims itself as“ Kentucky’ s only Independent Culinary Retail Store with Louisville’ s Premier Cooking School.” Cooking at the Cottage offers a potpourri of classes offered in evenings during the week and some Saturday noon classes. People with noneto-expert cooking skills can enjoy the school. I’ m an air fryer kind of cook whereas my friend produces restaurant level quality meals in her home. But we both enjoy the classes.
On a recent midwinter evening, we arrived at the Cottage for the class enticingly called“ Winter Warmers-Canadian Comforts.” This class was a demonstration class where the chef, Sophia Pepe, walked us all through the meal she prepared, and that we got to eat. Some of the classes are, like this one, demonstrations that invite discussion during the preparation, whereas others are hands-on cooking classes. For that hands-on class, induction burners drop from the ceiling, creating a cooking experience that can be replicated at home. There are also“ date nights” where two people at a table learn how to work together in preparing a very tasty meal“ with no drama.” There are even occasional
“ kids’ classes.” Chefs from Sullivan Culinary School, various caterers and restaurant chefs lead each class.
Recent classes come with such inviting descriptors as“ Contemporary European Faire,”“ The Country Kitchen,”“ Beginner’ s Sourdough Workshop“ and“ Fabulous French Macarons.” Our Winter Warmers class was led by Sophia Pepe, who herself is Canadian. She walked us though a wonderfully prepared meal with PEI Mussels with white wine, garlic and butter. She showed us how to prepare the mussels, cleaning and steaming the mollusks. This was followed by the Canadian Christmas traditional Tourti’ ere, or Quebec meat pie. The buttery crust and steaming pork and beef middle was a very hearty dish. It was accompanied by Pomes Persillade( crispy garlic roasted potatoes) and maple glazed winter vegetables. There was also dessert and in fact Sophia showed us how to make two different ones: a gooey butter tart and Nanaimo Bars( a rich chocolate custard bar). While this is listed as a demonstration class, Sophia was very engaging, encouraging questions on technique as well as the history of these Canadian dishes. So it never had the feeling of a passive televised cooking demonstration. We followed along with the written recipes that were at our places, and
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