A Participant's View of the One Month Course

One whole month spent in a state-of-the-art cookery school, dedicating the fillet of the day - those nine-to-five hours normally sacrificed to the pursuit of a living or the acquisition of an education or the running of a household - dedicating those daily hours to the one pure pleasure of cooking... What must that be like?

Well let me tell you, because before January 2011 that was a question which had haunted me for several years. It wouldn't go away, until eventually I knew I'd just have to go find out for myself.

First of all, it was - as I had thought - a pure pleasure. Everyday was full of sensory stimulation. Learning to recognise how bread dough should feel beneath the heel of your hand. Realising that once you smell a curry paste releasing each spice's aromas into the air you know it has also infused those flavours into the sauce itself. Observing how a guest chef keeps one ear open for the sounds through which his cooking pans talk to him, even as he regales us with his insider stories of working in top London kitchens. Watching closely how each dish is plated up, or how to remove a chicken fillet from a whole bird, or how to roll pasta, or form fritters, or whisk egg whites for perfect souffles. And of course tasting, tasting and tasting: new cheeses and old sherries, rich risottos and perfect pizzas, family-friendly dinners and dinner-party dishes, healthy lunches and hearty soups, finger-licking cakes and exquisite desserts, rustic breads and farmhouse-style scones, Moroccan tagines and Thai stir-fries and salads and Indian chutneys and Spanish tapas... In other words, enough recipes and techniques and culinary inspiration to keep you Cooking for Life.

We learnt to value the difference between olive oil for cooking and the very best extra virgin Ligurian olive oil, precious elixir shared generously with anyone who knew that it was a resource to be respected. Never ever did we feel that corners were being cut to save a quick buck - to the contrary, it was the best of ingredients all the way, and if a dish went wrong and needed redoing, well so be it. We were there to learn, from our mistakes as much as from our triumphs, and no cost was spared in the process.

We learnt too to feel at home in that gorgeous airy stylish space, to treat it as if it were our own place - which it was, for a month. It was where we lived from morning through to evening, where we had our elevenses of fresh baked bread and jam with fresh coffee, our fantastic three-course lunches (sometimes with wine!), and our elaborate Restaurant Night dinner when we got to show off all of our sophisticated skills.

But for all of the course's sophistications - and there were many - it was always grounded in a good honest love for the everyday appreciation of food. Yes there were dishes with which you could impress the most discerning dinner guests, but what was always impressed upon us was that food needn't be complicated to be delicious. And that taking food seriously can be a whole lot of fun.

It's an amazing thing to share an experience like spending a whole month learning to cook with sixteen one-time strangers. Because we cooked everyday with a different partner, we really had the chance to get to know each of the very different characters who had chosen to come on the course. When you work that closely with someone, you quickly establish a mutual trust and respect. You learn about team work, about pulling your weight, and letting go of control. You learn to accept when things don't go according to plan, and to give credit when they do. To say that we had fun throughout those four weeks is a great understatement; and to say that laughter is the sound I now associate with that converted warehouse space off Carysfort Avenue is no exageration.

I should probably warn you though. If you do decide to dedicate one month of your life to learning to cook at Lynda Booth's Dublin Cookery School - and, whoever you are, I can promise that you'll get so much out of the experience - you should be prepared. All good things must come to an end, and I'm not sure that any one of us was ready to say goodbye to what had been for so many a truly life-changing experience. Thankfully, we get to bring all that we learnt on our Cooking for Life course with us, and to relive the experience every single day of our lives, every time we ask ourselves the question: now, what would I like to eat? Or rather, what do I feel like cooking?

                                                                                                                 Aoife, January 2011