Class up your cooking

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

Want to learn to cook? You can’t say you don’t have enough options. Three very different Southern California cooking schools have announced their fall schedules.

The first, the Ecole de Cuisine Pasadena, located in a former restaurant on San Gabriel Boulevard, will focus on providing professional culinary training, with many classes scheduled so that working cooks can take advantage of them.

On the other hand, if you just want to learn to cook delicious food for your family and friends, there is the Venice Cooking School, led by two of Southern California’s best cookbook writers, Martha Rose Shulman and Clifford Wright. The school is so homey, in fact, that this fall’s classes will be taught Saturday evenings and Sunday afternoons in Shulman’s own kitchen. Attendance is limited to eight students a night.

And then there’s a third option: Well-known cookbook writer and cooking instructor Anne Willan is bringing her French La Varenne school to her new home in Santa Monica, where this fall she’ll present four classes, each taught by a different well-known Southern California chef. Dubbed “California Flair, French Savoir-Faire”, the classes will feature Anisette’s Alain Giraud, Josie’s Jose LeBalch, La Cachette Bistro’s Jean Francois Meteigner, and Spago pastry wizard Sherry Yard.

--Russ Parsons

(Photo of Martha Rose Shulman by Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times)