Hello everyone. I've just located your forum, and am pleased with the discovery. I'll do much browsing of past threads, but in the meantime, allow me to present my situation and ask for your advice.
I love cooking. During the summers between my years in high school I worked as a short order cook at the local Denny's. Two other men worked the breakfast shift with me. The speed and efficiency of being in the kitchen was pretty amazing. It wasn't until later in life that I appreciated how wonderful it can be to be in synch with other people in a kitchen. I'm sure you know how it can be when someone seems to always be under your feet in the kitchen. It was never that way during those summers. We seemed to anticipate each other's actions. It's difficult to put into words.
As I matured and learned to appreciate the subtleties of well-prepared meals, I wanted to learn more. Strangely, I never pursued cooking as a career. I followed my original passion (reading) to a degree in literature and an eventual job as a technical writer in Mountain View, California. To make a long and familiar story short, I am married to a wonderful woman, and have two happy children. I also have a mortgage that prevents me from leaving my current job to pursue formal education in the culinary arts.
Being in the kitchen is something that brings me a good deal of satisfaction, but it is highly doubtful I will find a way to be a professional chef. Still, I would like to become an educated chef. To this end I am pursuing various means, and I have hope that you can lend advice.
My understanding wife has enrolled me in some Home Chef cooking classes. (Home Chef is a cooking supply store that offers weekly classes.) Do you have an opinion of the quality of these classes?
I would like a formal text, so that I might educate myself at home. I have seen one published by the CIA, and another by Le Cordon Bleu. Both look promising. Would you suggest one of these or another text?
All other advice is warmly appreciated, as I try to satisfy a calling I have realized late in life. Thank you much.
Joseph
I love cooking. During the summers between my years in high school I worked as a short order cook at the local Denny's. Two other men worked the breakfast shift with me. The speed and efficiency of being in the kitchen was pretty amazing. It wasn't until later in life that I appreciated how wonderful it can be to be in synch with other people in a kitchen. I'm sure you know how it can be when someone seems to always be under your feet in the kitchen. It was never that way during those summers. We seemed to anticipate each other's actions. It's difficult to put into words.
As I matured and learned to appreciate the subtleties of well-prepared meals, I wanted to learn more. Strangely, I never pursued cooking as a career. I followed my original passion (reading) to a degree in literature and an eventual job as a technical writer in Mountain View, California. To make a long and familiar story short, I am married to a wonderful woman, and have two happy children. I also have a mortgage that prevents me from leaving my current job to pursue formal education in the culinary arts.
Being in the kitchen is something that brings me a good deal of satisfaction, but it is highly doubtful I will find a way to be a professional chef. Still, I would like to become an educated chef. To this end I am pursuing various means, and I have hope that you can lend advice.
My understanding wife has enrolled me in some Home Chef cooking classes. (Home Chef is a cooking supply store that offers weekly classes.) Do you have an opinion of the quality of these classes?
I would like a formal text, so that I might educate myself at home. I have seen one published by the CIA, and another by Le Cordon Bleu. Both look promising. Would you suggest one of these or another text?
All other advice is warmly appreciated, as I try to satisfy a calling I have realized late in life. Thank you much.
Joseph
