Bon Appetit

Last night, my mom and I drove an hour and a half through a snow storm to go to our second ever cooking class. We had high expectations for this one, especially after our experience at the CIA, which was more military style basic training than lighthearted day in the kitchen.

Because of the snow and the crazy twisting backroads, we arrived a little late, mid-way through the preparation of the first course, a blue cheese and caramelized onion sandwich. This, along with the last thing we made, (which I'll get to in a minute) were by far my favorites. I think I could just keep a jar of the caramelized onion mixture - sweet onions cooked until brown and gooey, chopped up golden raisins, and a little rice vinegar - in the fridge and add it to whatever I was eating. Dare I say it could replace BBQ sauce as my favorite condiment...

Throughout the rest of the night we worked through feta puffs (eh), broccoli with hollandaise sauce (eh), smashed potato parmesan cakes (really just vehicles for massive amounts of butter, garlic, and more cheese), rib eye steaks (mmmooo), and, last but not least, the dessert. I had been waiting for this one. Even the name of the recipe had me salivating for days ahead of time: molten chocolate cakes with raspberry sauce.

It was almost 11 by the time we got to making these babies, and people were dropping like flies. There were 5 of us (down from 9 total) by the time they emerged from the oven, and good lord was it worth the wait - and the work! Even in our state of steak-bloated exhaustion, the teacher had us double buttering and flouring 15 little fluted cake pans because "that's what Jean Georges says to do" in preparation for the rich, gooey batter.

As I cracked through the delicate outer crust and the molten chocolate oozed out, I understood the pan treatment. And I'd have done it all again just to yield the same result. The raspberry sauce and the vanilla whipped cream melted down the fluted sides of the cake and into the goo, and all I could do was nod my head vigorously as I ate. It was all I had hoped it would be... and more.

Amazingly, the roads had been plowed and the light snow that was falling when we walked out of the cooking store was nothing compared to the thick curtain of wet flakes that had been coming down when we arrived. We left full and happy, even though the class kept my mom up way too late on a school night. (Luckily, she had a delayed opening this morning.) The next culinary challenge I hope to tackle is bread-baking. We already have our sights set on a cooking school out west...