Elements of Botanical Cuisine – Certificate

Hands-on teaching meets hands-on learning

75% Technique & 25% Theory

With 10 hours of training, the Elements of Botanical Cuisine – Certificate combines both hands-on instruction and theory into one comprehensive weekend course.

Each day of the weekend course has been organized to teach you the essentials of the culinary arts. The pace of the course accelerates as you progress through each hour, and learning is cumulative and fast.

Day 1

Introduction to Culinary Techniques

Here the standards will be set. You’ll begin to learn the culinary techniques and the discipline that will serve as the foundation, not just for your time in class, but for your entire culinary career. You’ll become oriented with using the equipment and tools of the professional kitchen and gain an understanding of the brigade system of organization and teamwork, which is at the heart of every serious kitchen.

To become an efficient member of a kitchen, you need to gain control over your knife set. You’ll learn which knives are best for which jobs, and how to properly care for them. Through a series of intensive, repetitive exercises, you’ll become comfortable handling your knives, allowing you to produce uniform pieces that will combust the flavours evenly and have visual appeal. Through talliage (cutting vegetables into even sizes and shapes), you’ll learn a variety of different techniques, including émincer (thin slice), batonnet (small sticks), brunoise (small dice), and paysanne (tile shaped), to name a few. You’ll move on learning the fundamentals of raw food cuisine.

What you’ll learn:

• Knife handling & cutting techniques
• Brigade system of the kitchen
• Introduction to herbarium
• Nut based dairy
• Introduction to sous vide “poaching” techniques
• Working with liquid nitrogen
• Pasta making – working with raw dough
• Dehydrating techniques

Day 2

Building Culinary Foundations

You’ll build and expand upon the knowledge you developed in Day 1 as you continue to practice culinary techniques. While you explore a range of new ingredients and techniques, your chef-instructors will encourage you to think critically about the composition of your plates—a skill that will be increasingly emphasized as you move closer to “cooking” in L’Ecole.

What you’ll learn:

• The art of Nordic cuisine
• Cold larder composition
• L’Ecole composition
• Plating

Elements of Botanical Cuisine – Certificate Weekend Course Booking Information

Date: Saturday 15th – Sunday 16th October 2011
Time: 11:30am – 4.30pm (11:00am check-in)
Venue: Chapel Hill Winery, 1 Chapel Hill Road Mclaren Vale, SA
Parking: Free parking
Public Transport Options: TBC
Required equipment: Vegetable knife, carving knife, steel and tea towels
Prerequisites: None
Total number of hours: 10 hours over two days
Investment: $499

Available Spaces: 12 only – FULL