I’ve been to one or two blogger events. Some I’ve found fascinating – there’s a great variety of people who blog and the subjects are just as interesting. So, we might all write about food, for example, but then the backgrounds are different, the audiences are different, the subjects around food (vegetarian, vegan, family, fine dining, dinner parties, to name a few) can be utterly different.
Earlier this month, Oven Pride and Cheshire Cookery School joined forces and invited a small gaggle of bloggers to a get together at the School’s premises in Altrincham. First up was an Oven Pride demonstration (who told them about the state of my oven? No seriously, who?), before experienced chef Kurt Thomas would demonstrate two recipes for us. Finally, we would then make the recipes ourselves and sit down to eat our creations.
While I consider myself a pretty good cook, I’m by no means an expert, so the opportunity to learn more from such an experienced chef appealed no end. I turned up on a dark and cold night, along with 12 others, a little nervous but intrigued.
Getting over our nerves with a cup of tea and a chat, we were introduced to Kurt, and invited through to see the Oven Pride demonstration. I have to admit, I was impressed and, as I write, my poor oven is going through the cleaning of it’s life. I love that it’s that easy and I don’t even have to be in the kitchen while it works.
Onto the cooking itself. Kurt began with a sour dough bread, which I was immediately impressed with. Bread is my nemesis. I used to be very good at it. Over the last couple of years I seem to have lost the knack and not retrieved it. I was thrilled with how easy this recipe was and as it slid into the oven, I have to admit, my fingers began to itch to get started.
It was all set up ready for us.
Onto the demonstration of the chicken and Tuscan bean stew with chorizo. And my fingers itched more. I wanted to cook already. I could do this.
But I waited and watched. We sampled the sour dough bread when it returned from the oven (yes, the recipe is that quick) and watched while Kurt completed the chicken dish. And then the ever present blogger scrum happened to get a shot of it.
I tried not to giggle.
Finally we could leap into cooking. First the sour dough, which was ridiculously easy.
Then onto the stew. And I fell in love a little bit. The demonstrations use an induction hob. Quick, energy efficient and much safer than many other hobs. Given we’re updating our kitchen, this is going on the wish list!
Retrieving my bread from the oven, I was impressed – quick, easy and tasty.
And the stew wasn’t too shabby either. I was very pleased with it all and there was enough stew left for me to take it home, along with the bread for Mr GFB, who’s lunch time fare went up a notch.
All in all, we had a great time, met a lot of new bloggers and got to admire the gorgeous array of equipment and gadgetry and the Cookery School.
If you want to recreate these yourselves, the recipes can be found here.
I’ll keep you posted on the oven!
