Meze Cooking Class

I started working in kitchens at 16 and have spent more than 40 years cooking, teaching, developing recipes, running kitchens, and staying curious about food.At 18, I went to the California Culinary Academy in San Francisco, followed by pastry training in Copenhagen. My career has taken me through restaurants, pastry, catering, private cooking, culinary education, program development, and training.Teaching became a big part of my work early on. I’ve taught in culinary schools, colleges, and public cooking programs, and developed classes and curriculum for national culinary organizations. I’ve taught everything from foundational cooking skills to baking, pastry, seafood, global cuisines, flavor, and food science.I teach from a place of exploration. I like the whys.Why does something brown? What does acid do to flavor? Why does one sauce come together while another breaks? What changes when you toast a spice, change the heat, add salt, or give something another two minutes in the pan?Flavor and the science of cooking have always been part of how I teach. I want you to taste, notice, ask questions, and make decisions while you cook. A recipe gives us a place to start. Understanding what is happening with the food gives you much more room to play.If something tastes flat, we figure out why. If a sauce breaks, there is a reason. If the crust is crisp and the inside is tender, there is a reason for that too. Cooking gets a lot more interesting once you start paying attention to those things.I started Cook’s Culinary Collective because I wanted to bring the fun back into cooking. My classes are hands-on, social, curious, and full of good food. We cook. We taste. We make adjustments. We talk about what is happening and where we want to take it next.I bring Cook’s Culinary Collective to homes, offices, and gathering spaces throughout Seattle. I work with groups from six people around a kitchen island to events for up to 100. Groups come to explore a cuisine, learn a technique, sharpen their skills, celebrate something, or spend a few hours together around food.Come curious. Bring an appetite. Be willing to explore.