Madhubani fish wall hanging (gifted to my ex- Boss)

Culinary adventures (photo story) - Dubai Diary

June to November 2018 saw me enrolling at SCAFA, Dubai.

This professional school (tucked away in Cluster I of JLT) is for cooking enthusiasts. I was pleasantly surprised to find it was within walking distance of the Metro station as well as the UCAM institute. Some items were drool worthy, some directed to the dustbin. The interesting ones made it to my office colleagues, instructors at AM Folklore School and even my building security guards. 

Many thanks to Chef Emily (Chile), Chef Toya (Nigeria) and Chef Eduardo (Venezuela) for patiently guiding us. 

The Macaron, panna cotta class was the first one. My office colleagues were happy to remind me when they tasted the macarons that Joy shared is multiplied and one good turn (read desert) deserves another :)

Macarons

Yellow ones belong to Moi

Panna Cotta

I really enjoyed making the panna cotta. This is really easy to make and can be prepared a day in advance if you have guests as it needs time to set.

Second innings were dedicated to apple crumble, caramel custard or creme brulee and cheesecake. The apple crumble and caramel custard were too yum for me to share ;-)

Apple crumble

Chef Emily demonstrates plating

Cheese cake anyone?

Caramel custard - yum yum!

The next class was a savoury one. We learnt to prepare fish tempura (Spain), ceviche (Latin America), Fish Papilotte (French) and Thai prawn curry (South east Asian). The class was fun with all kinds of aromas. We had two professional chefs who had been sent by their restaurant for additional training. So by the time we had de-veined the prawns these two merry souls had finished preparing two dishes!! They were far too humble to gloat and instead spent time assisting us in our misadventures with the crustaceans left at our mercy.

Ceviche

Ceviche

Fish Tempura

Thai Prawn Curry with Lemon Grass

Fish Papiotte

Fish cooked by steam in foil

 The subsequent session was back to my sweet tooth. This time Chef Emily guided us to prepare lemon tarts (in lemon curd), profiteroles (very tedious firangi malpua), banana bread with cinnamon and walnuts (err...we used the muffin moulds) and madelines (loved making and eating these!)

Lemon Tart

Profiteroles

Banana Bread muffin ;-)

Madelines

The next baking class was a tough body building one. We had to prepare the meringue - this is painful, tedious and beats bench pressing in the gym coz your arms get a nasty workout. We all were missing our electronic beaters while Chef Emily merrily encouraged the competition among us grumpy lot!. Here's a picture of her basting with a mini gun the meringue on the cake! The cake incidentally is Venezuelan dish known as leche de torte (a.k.a cake in 3 kinds of rich and creamy milk). This was absolutely delicious and I realised my colleague from Venezuela had got this during a pot luck at the office. 

We also had a savoury baking class - this too led to the arms getting a serious work out. We baked Foccasia bread with rosemary and cherry tomatoes, Spinach quiche (really easy to make) and pizzas ( the thin crust needs to be really thin!). This was one of the most fun classes for us. We had a lot of creativity deployed as amateur chefs when it came to fillings and toppings. The pizza and focassia bread were happily enjoyed at office as well!

Focassia bread before oven

Pizza base rests and rises to the occasion

Spinach quiche

Pizza a la Montax

Baked Focassia Bread

 The next class was another attempt at Macarons (some of which did not fare too well) and the panna cotta (which did and was delicious). We had a bro-sis combo as participants and they took immense delight in each other's misshapen macarons while the rest of us "grown ups" looked on indulgently.

Panna cotta (green)

Panna cotta plated

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