The Garden of Ideas, the outdoor community center and garden sanctuary in Ridgefield, is hosting a series ofmonthly cooking demonstrations and workshops from May through November with Chef Susie Buckley.
Each class will focus on how to make the most of the seasonal produce, using the bounty of their CSA as a way to highlight the intersection of food, nature, art and science within each workshop. Classes welcome all ages (kids from 8 years and up, and adults) and will feature fresh farm produce, focusing on basic cooking techniques, "nibbles, tastes, and recipes, included." View the complete class schedule below:
Saugatuck Grain + Grape is going to be holding a series of wine education classes. Classes will be held every other week this spring. The series will cover everything from "Introduction to Wine Tasting, Lexicon, and Labels" to "The World Through Rosé Covered Glasses" as they dive into specific varietals. For those who don't know Mimi and her team, there will most definitely be fun, food and some bad wine jokes in every session.
Classes will be led by Mimi McLaughlin and Jon Carr, the newest member of the SG+G team. There will be nibbles prepared by Mark Hepperman, their in-house chef, so your tummy and taste buds will be happy in a multitude of ways.
Below is a break down of the syllabus, cost and dates. Please call the store to reserve your spot.
I like to let my face grow its own sweater for the colder months. Having a glossy layer of man-fur dulls the teeth of the winter wind, people seem to like my more avuncular look, and growing a beard takes slightly less work than shaving every day, so technically I'm conserving the planet's resources. You're welcome.
I've noticed the delicate liquid measurements, tweezing of botanicals, and arguing over the perfect shape for a single unit of ice has lead many adherents of cocktail culture to treat their faces like overly manicured topiary. There will always be respect and, above that, love in my heart for those who create finely constructed, strong and delicious cocktails, but an enthusiastic ransacking of my home will never turn up a single tin of mustache wax.
When I met Aaren Simoncini of Beer'd Brewing in Stonington, he was wearing a shirt that said "beer is art"and his beard didn't look like an aluminum foil swan full of lo mein. We nodded at each other and I approached.
Session beers are popular now, but a single drinking session rarely includes 250 different beers. The Big Brew NY Beer Festival returned to White Plains on Feb. 7 with hundreds of kegged and bottled beers, plus a VIP area with almost 30 casks of special ales. It's tough to write with a beer in one hand and camera in the other, but I managed to record a few notes and observations from what has become a very good midsize beer festival.
First: it may look crowded in a few of these photos, but the crowd was never an issue. Beer fest attendees tend to be pretty easy going. Most seem happy just to be in a place where they can simply stick out their glass and have it filled, and it's exciting to try new brands and styles without running the risk of taking your first sip and realizing you're now stuck with a six pack of beer you wouldn't use to poison driveway weeds.
Deep snow requires strong booze. Our ancestors knew it, we know it, and every year around the winter solstice we can see a certain class of beer made specifically for snow days start to take up shelf space. Barleywine is beer better served at 55º than 35º, and best enjoyed when it's 25º outside. It's usually sold in large format bottles of the 22-26oz. variety, and will wrap you in an invisible sweater of at least 10% alcohol. Blizzards are a good thing when you're properly stocked.
Barleywine has been deployed as a winter knock out drop by bored or insufficiently rowdy residents of the frostier climes for centuries. It is NyQuil by another name, and it is a blessed boon to those of us who seek to replace the lost hours of sunlight with - in order - hijinks and oblivion.
Who wouldn't love a culinary-themed weekend getaway that is about an hour away (maybe two for those of you up in Litchfield County)?! The Saybrook Point Inn & Spa is kicking off a series of weekend getaways focusing on different cuisines from around the world centered on the Inn's restaurant, Fresh Salt, and led by its Executive Chef Leslie Tripp. Kicking off this series of three events is Italian Winter Holiday from January 30 to February 1, followed by a Taste of New England on February 20 - 22 and a Tour de France on March 6 - March 8.
Aux Delices' 2015 Winter/Spring Kids & Adult Cooking Class Schedule has just been announced. Aux Délices offers cooking classes for adults and children at their professional catering kitchen in Stamford. Classes are generally held on Wednesday evenings for adults and Sunday afternoons for children. Classes are hands-on for children and both participation and demonstration for adults.
Their focus is to teach easy, interesting and seasonal food preparation, utilizing a variety of cooking techniques. The chef instructors are from Aux Délices, as well as from well-known restaurants in Fairfield County and New York City. Lynn Manheim, the Cooking School Director does an incredible job engaging and challenging both children and adults, while teaching students the basics of cooking along the way.
View the complete schedule below...For more information, click here.
If you're still looking for the unique gift for that special person. Give them a memorable experience that is both fun & useful. Sign them up for a cooking class at The Schoolhouse at Cannondale Restaurant in Wilton Ct. In fact, sign up with them. Chef Tim LaBant & his staff will be sharing their years of experience each Tuesday evening beginning in February. You'll also savor the finished culinary delights after the class. The schedule and focus for each evening is as follows:
February 3...Winter Braising and knife skills February 10...Appetizers and ingredient pairing guidlines February 17...How to prepare our most favorite soups and stocks February 24...Duck cookery and grain preparation March 3...Fish cookery; wet and dry cooking methods.When to use each method
Chef Pat Pascarella of Bar Sugo in Norwalk announced that he will conduct a new series of cooking classes beginning in Jan 2015! For those readers who have visited Bar Sugo and enjoyed his great meatballs, pastas and entrées, these classes will give the secrets for creating some of these delicious dishes at home.
There are currently six scheduled classes:
Fresh Pasta Workshop – Saturday January 24th at 11:00am
Mama's Kitchen: Meatballs 101 – Saturday February 7th at 11:00am
Art of Braising – Tuesday March 3rd at 7:00pm
Pizza Workshop – Tuesday April 7th at 7:00pm
Farmer's Harvest & Feast – Saturday May 16th at 11:00am
Cooking with Seafood - Tuesday, June 2nd at 7:00pm
Mild and milky, smooth and silky: any way one stretches it, people love fresh mozzarella! And in this hands-on crash course, participants will learn to make it at home. On November 15th, from 10:30 -noon, Chef Pietro will explain coagulation as how milk turns from fluid to firm curds. Then, participants will roll up their sleeves to turn curds into the beautiful balls that are known as fresh mozzarella. Taste several samples of fresh cheeses (think mozzarella, burrata!).
Local Chef Pietro Scotti, of DaPietro's in Westport will teach the ins and outs tof making fresh mozzarella and burrata in this Saturday Cheese-Making Workshop at Wakeman Town Farm. To register, simply email wakemantownfarm@gmail.com and provide the name and number of people in your party. Class is $45 per person, and limited to 12. Respondents will be notified of acceptance into the workshop and will pay at the door.
A Rare Opportunity to Learn Truffle Making from the Master!
When Master Chocolatier Fritz Knipschildt opened his artisan chocolate business, Gourmet magazine named his mouth-watering classic truffle, "One of the Top Three Truffles in the World!"
In this hands-on class, you will work side-by-side with Fritz to create his award-winning truffles. You will discover the secrets of the ingredients and participate in creating the creamy ganache. Learn why 71% Ecuadorian single-bean dark chocolate is the key to this delightful treat and experience the delicious changes you can create by adding herbs and spices to the ganache and cocoa powder.
You'll taste as you go and enjoy a glass or two of Fritz's favorite wine while you prepare these heavenly treats. And, of course, you'll take home samples and the recipe to allow you to create these for your family and friends!
"I wish it was winter so we could freeze it into ice blocks and skate on it and melt it in the spring time and drink it!" Beerfest is a movie by Broken Lizard (the Super Troopers guys), who take the "unlikely hero saves the rec center" trope and get it knee-walking drunk in front of horrified loved ones. I'm a big fan. The action centers on the proprietors of Schnitzengiggle Tavern, a family of German descendants on a quest to regain both a long lost lager recipe, and America's beer drinking honor. The movie is extravagantly crass, usually leaves me sore both from laughing and a hangover, and MAY have been the inspiration for New England Brewing Company's Schnitzengiggles Festbier.Allegedly. Schnitzengiggles pours a distinctly brassy color, with a respectably sticky head. There are more hops to the nose than most märzens, and just a light whiff of malt. It is a beautifully smooth, slightly dry lager, and it has a very nice marbling of grainy richness. The hop character comes through in terms of a fruity flavor, rather than the more staid, traditional bitterness, and I'd say that's to be expected from the brewery that brought us Gandhi-Bot and Coriolis. I could and would drink this by the stein, liter, or glass boot.
Fairfield Cheese Company classes are back in session and school has never been this delicious. Whether you are a cheese novice looking for a anintroduction to the basics, or a cheese-aficionado seeking to expand your knowledge on a specific variety, they've got the class for you.
I jumped at the chance to attend one of these sessions back in October and spent some time with owners Laura and Christopher who lead these entertaining and informative evenings. If you would like some background on Fairfield Cheese Company, check out our review, "Cheese 101."
With wine pairings from Harry's Wine & Liquor, this is the perfect way to break out of that dinner-and-a-movie date night rut.
What to do with your overly bountiful harvest? Millstone Farm has a few ideas. How about canning, pickling and preserving those gorgeous veggies and fruit? Seems daunting? Not at all. Just sign up for one of the workshops below...
Canning & Preserving Tomatoes Sat. Sept. 27: 10am – 1pm Join Annie Farrell and others at Millstone Farm and learn how to preserve yoursummer tomatoes so they can last you all winter long. Learn the basics of canning, freezing, and methods of storing tomatoes. Come prepared to chop, cook, can, and taste. We will use water bath method, and discuss pressure canning. We will tour the farm if time and weather allow. Up to 20 participants. $30 per person.
I enjoy large scale beer events, music festivals, and Halloween for most of the same reasons. They include many of my favorite things in the same place, and all offer an equal possibility of seeing a bear in a hockey sweater dancing with Deadpool. A certain degree of madness (encouraged, tolerated or otherwise) is the ichor which circulates and gives these events life. Sound becomes emotion, quirks become costumes - the variegated states of being human, all our inner worlds, come crashing together and go supernova. Yes, I like that. So I tend to seek out the far out.
Danes seem to have a bit of a knack for madness, whether in front of the camera like Mads Mikkelen, behind it like Lars von Trier, or creating the liquor of its inspiration, like Jeppe Jarnit-Bjergsø of Evil Twin. The brand staggers its production around the world, even brewing some of its beers in Connecticut, but it all comes back to Jeppe, the Danish Willy Wonka: creations like Femme Fatale, an IPA brewed with Yuzu fruit and enough brettanomyces yeast to make the hop aroma fight it out with the smell of wet horse.
Few sensations enliven the mind like eye-catchingnovelty. Our minds have evolved such a predilection to find the next new thing, it's a compulsion. This is why slot machines are addictive even though they're so repetitive: there's something new every time. The new glass house is made of screens. Status, tweet, pin... tap, tap, tap.
It's easy to read about how this river of information which flows to us has made Americans indistinguishable from the couches which we permanently inhabit, but I think this is losing sight of the fact that rivers are also a means of transport. Ideas are hardly stationary. This week, let's take a look at a few novelties which have arrived on the Connecticut beer scene, and see if we can get some wheels turning.
Jack's Abbey launched just three years ago up in Massachusetts and has seemingly been winning awards ever since. The company is run by Jack, Eric and Sam Hendler, scions of an ice manufacturing family, whose Hendler Farms supplies man of the ingredients found in their beers. The brand name comes from Jack (who earned a degree in brewing in '07) and his wife, Abbey - whose name worked out pretty well as a reference to monkish beer brewing traditions. I started off with their Mass Rising Imperial Pils.
You're hungry, but you sit there, getting hungrier, because you don't know what you want to eat. Spoiled for choice, you end up ravenous and choosing the closest, quickest option for an ultimately unsatisfying resolution. An Italian combo sub is good, but Thai would have been better. Barbeque usually hits the spot, but enchiladas suizas are what you were really craving. Sometimes having fewer options can lead to happier conclusions. This week I'm going to give you a few options in three categories, and hopefully it will make your decisions a little easier the next time you're faced with a giant wall of six packs, or a tap list with fifty options.
How about something fruitier to start? A drink almost like a punch, or a cocktail you'd get at a tiki bar? One answer to sate this need is Birrificio del Ducato Frambozschella. This is an Italian beer made with fresh raspberries and lactic acid, then aged in wooden barrels. It pours a deep, dark ruby red, and had almost no head at all as it was poured for me. You'll be able to smell the pH from four inches away and it's sour, but it never threatened to turn my face inside out.
Is May about the newly arriving crocuses (crocii?)? Or about the greening of our lawns after the longest winter ever? Nah. Let’s get down to business-it’s about finding camps for your kiddos before the summer hits and all of those spots are filled! The emails have begun flying and the scramble is beginning. What’s new? What’s fun? How about forgoing the traditional Camp Gitchigoomee canoes and bonfires and, instead, fan the flames of summer creativity in some area kitchens with cooking camps for kids!
Here is a list of 8 Kids Cooking Classes & Summer Camps for 2014:
Dark beers and dark nights are falling away. Fresh life is shouldering its way through the crusty ground, and new batches of lively, energetic spring seasonals are seeing the light of day for the first time in brewery tasting rooms across the country.Spring time is for beer lovers.
The season lends itself to saisons, the ancient staple of farmers and field hands in need of relief during the planting and cultivation of new life. Stillwater Artisinal Ales is celebrating the arrival of fresh, new life with the release of its Debutante American Farmhouse Ale. This saison, brewed with a combination of spelt and rye, and accented with a blend of heather, honeysuckle, and hyssop, is actually a collaboration between Stillwater and Belgian beer specialists The Brewer's Art, of Baltimore.
Photo: Garden of Ideas
