Cookery School

Before Christmas I received a lovely surprise email telling me that I'd won a competition for two tickets to a cookery school in London. I didn't even have to do anything as it was a random prize draw! So last week we travelled down to London (on one of the snowiest days of the year) and got ready for a day of healthy and nutritious cooking.

Seared tuna with an oriental dressing

The day was good fun and best of all we got to eat all the food we cooked too. None of the recipes were difficult and all would be easy to do even on a busy mid-week night but it's good to pick up little tips and ideas particularly on how to present the food attractively. The starter of seared tuna only took a few minutes to make (and eat!) although being a bit of chili fiend, I would add a little fresh red chili to spice this up a little.

Oregano marinated lamb with rice and apricots

For the main course we marinated a lamb steak in lemon juice, zest and oregano and made a simple spiced rice with star anise, cinnamon and dried apricots before smothering in fresh coriander and toasted pine nuts. Again fantastically simple and I've probably made something similar in the past but delicious nonetheless (the plate above was mine, the chef's plated a considerably smaller portion...ho hum, I was hungry!).

'Deconstructed' summer fruit cheesecake

The dessert was rather more fancy and we even served it on a slate! The 'cheese' part is low fat Philadelphia cheese whipped with fresh vanilla, a tablespoon or two of whipping cream and a tiny amount of icing sugar. The berries were briefly warmed with a little sugar to become glazed and oozy and the biscuit base was a few toasted hazelnuts and a single digestive biscuit coated with a little melted icing sugar. The shards on top are a rather fancy lemon yoghurt tuile which we made with sugar, yoghurt powder and dried lemon zest. It all took no more than half an hour and tasted great. In addition to all of this (which we ate with the other prize winners for lunch with several bottles of wine) we also made a paneer and sweet potato curry and pork souvlaki with flatbreads and tzatziki. Yes, no need to ask, I ate everything!