More and more people nowadays get excited about the idea of learning the cooking craft. Some go online and look for the websites and blogs of famous chefs to learn the wisdom from them. Other category of people decides to actually go to cooking classes and culinary schools to get the essential knowledge first-hand. While online education differs a lot, culinary schools, in general, are similar in their core. For this reason, we address the question of what one can learn at culinary schools today. Learn about the skills you can master and experiences that are waiting for you at culinary schools.
6 skills you learn at culinary schools
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Confidence in the kitchen
We all feel lost in the kitchen sometimes, especially when cooking a new meal or trying to surprise our family. You can gain confidence in the art of cooking on your own, but this may take ages! Culinary schools aim at boosting your confidence and teaching you how to use your brain without a recipe. In the beginning, you are likely to take lots of notes, but at the end of the cooking classes you will be only observing and applying the new knowledge to your own experience. Over the course you will learn to look at some recipe and chef and get the idea of the dish to improve it yourself instead of copying.
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Properly read a recipe
Most frequently people in the kitchen follow the recipes on a step-by-step basis. They are afraid that if some changes are made to the instructions, the whole dish will not be as tasty as planned. However, there are brave hearts who try to make alternations to the recipes to make the dishes taste even better. And this is the skill you can truly advance at cooking classes. Professional chefs explain that while reading a recipe you need to think how to make it become your best dish, what spices or steps will make it taste in your own unique style. For now, you need to remember that recipes are only guidelines. Cooking is not mathematics, it’s art.
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What always must be in the kitchen
You know that in a wardrobe there are basic elements that can be paired with anything. The same thing exists in cooking. Culinary schools teach their students to understand that there are foods and spices that can make everything tastier! For example, there can never be too much butter; it always makes the dish softer and tastier. Salt is another basic element that should always be at hand; there is a great chance that you under-salt every dish you’re making! If you want to add some freshness to your meal, add some lemon to it (regardless if it’s pastry or meat). And don’t forget about eggs – they are a miraculous element that can do anything and everything in the kitchen.
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The importance of having a good paring knife
Everyone has ever watched some movie about a chef and saw that he or she has a knife that they guard with their lives. For ordinary people this seems like a weird habit. However, culinary schools will open your eyes on the importance of having essential knives for your cooking. You are likely to know nothing about paring knives for now, but once you try using one of them in your kitchen, you will literally see the world in a different light!
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Creative cooking
Very often we have a list of dishes that we cook. So when one of the ingredients from our traditional recipe is missing, we get stuck and can’t get over it. Culinary schools teach to overcome such blocks. Whatever you have in the kitchen can be cooked and made delicious! All you need is a little creativity! Under no circumstances you should let the lack of something stop you from cooking a tasty dinner for your family! Moreover, culinary schools teach the ability to make any dish tasty. After the classes you won’t feel the need to buy the most expensive meat in the store because you will know how to make the cheapest one taste fantastic!
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Using every bit of the product
In most cases, daily routines lead us to the stores where we buy pre-made stock. We throw away bones and pieces of meat not knowing what to do with them. As a result, we literally throw money down the drain! But culinary schools can teach you how to use every bit of meat that you’ve bought. Any bone can be used as the base for the stock and there is no need to use it right away. Cook the stock and leave it for tomorrow. Use your products wisely!
One may say that all of these skills described above have nothing to do with culinary schools and can be learnt on your own. Well in fact, they do come from experience mostly. But the important fact is that at a culinary school you are able to receive the most of experience in the least of time. If you try doing it on your own, this process may take decades. Don’t waste your time! Find a culinary school and start cooking like a chef! Believe us, your family will appreciate it.
