Cooks Warehouse Classes Oct 26-29th!

You can register for classes at www.cookswarehouse.com or phone 800-449-0996

Friday: October 26th: 6:30-9:30pm  Brookhaven Location

Friday Night Date Night Dinner Party                                         Hands On

 Learn together as a couple how to produce a dinner party for your friends. Lots of techniques, fun and great flavorful food. With this full menu you will learn who does what in your kitchen and how to time your prep time so you can enjoy the party too.

Menu: Fromage Fort with Crusty Garlic Brushed Baguette, Crispy Chicken Cakes with Dill Mayonnaise, Prawn Salad with Roasted Eggplant, BBQ French Herbed Salmon, Roasted Herb New Potatoes, Snap Beans with Beurre Noir and Moulton Chocolate Cakes with Chantilly Crème.

October 27^th, 2012               10:30am-1:30pm                            Midtown Location

Deep Rich Chocolate ~ Back to the Basics                             Hands On

Every baker should have each of these recipes in their repertory. George is the former pastry chef for the Walt Disney Co and would create many new desserts for the guests. Now you can too

Menu: Blackout Cake with Poured Chocolate Ganache, Chocolate Chip Pecan Pie in a Flakey Crust, Chocolate Mud Bars with Frosting, Italian Chocolate Biscotti and Mini Chocolate Baked Donuts with Raspberry Sauce.

October 28^th, 2012               1:00pm-4:00pm             Decatur Location

Cake Baking 101                                                      Hands On

No More Boxes! Cake mixes have so many preservatives. Make these fresh and simple cakes that will delight your family. You will learn the proper way to mix, bake and ice cakes like a professional.

Menu: Rich Devils Food with a Fudge Frosting, Hummingbird Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting, Banana Chip Bundt Cake with a poured Glaze, Red Velvet Cake with a 7 minute Frosting and Snow White Cake with a Toasted Coconut Frosting.

 October 29^th, 2012               7:00pm-9:00pm                               East Cobb Location

Say Cheesecake!                                                                           Demonstration

George is the author of two award winning cheesecake cookbooks. You have seen his cheesecakes in the 1980s from the Emmy winning Golden Girls Show. Learn how to make great prefect sweet and savory cheesecakes with ease.

Menu: Chipotle Chile Cheesecake, Taco Cheesecake, The Golden Girls Cheesecake, Peanut Butter and Chocolate Cheesecake Bars and Lemon Curd Cheese Pie. 

All Chocolate!

Texas.. & Chocolate !

I am here in Texas for a whirlwind tour.. 5 classes, 5 cities, 4 car rentals, over 200 students, 4 hotels and 6 air flights, 2 different airlines flying thousands of miles.. in 5 days! Yes.. 5 Days! It has been a few years since I have been here teaching in Texas and it was great last night seeing so many past students. 

Here is a great fast easy recipe we made last night. 

Chocolate Pots de Creme 

Enjoy!

George

Cinnamon Rolls.. Yea!

Cinnamon Rolls. 

Hot and fresh.. when you hear those two words you think of cinnamon and warmth from a kitchen. Years ago I created a Cinnamon Roll that I taught on the pilot of The Mike and Maty Show.. feeding the entire 250 people in the audience hot cinnamon roll lead to being on the show as a regular. 

This week LA Weekly had an article on the top 10 cinnamon rolls of Los Angeles. I have eaten in a few and really.. Nothing special. Here is the link:

LA Weekly

Now I am a little biased.. YOu choose for yourself.. Here is alink to mine.. And look at the picture.. You get plenty of icing! Lots of it! Plus in 1995 I won the Best Cinnamon Roll Recipe from OC Register.. I think I woudl win today too. 

George's Cinnamon Rolls

Smiles Service Samples… The Three “S’s”

See’s Candy makes it the fourth!

The three S’s has been a motto for years. If you have ever walked into the See’s candy stores around the west you will always see a older lady in a black and white picture on the wall. That’s Mary, mother of the founder Charles. After his father had passed in 1919 in Canada, his mother Mary came out Pasadena to live with he and his wife Florence.  462 South Marengo Avenue, Pasadena, CA.

 

Charles started experimenting with his mothers candy recipes. Some of the original candies are still sold today. Chocolate Walnut Fudge, Victoria Toffee, Hand Dipped Bon Bons and Maple Walnut Creams.

 

Researching where the first candy factory/store was I found the address. 135 North Western, Los Angeles, CA. Close to the old Bullocks Wilshire. They first had Indian then Harley's outfitted special for delivery of the boxed chocolates. The driver looked a little bit like a off-duty LAPD officer.

Checking on google.maps I found it was still there and the conservancy was trying to have the city grant it historical status. Looking at the building I was saddened. I thought that if it was still standing I could maybe take pictures and send them to the CEOs office to get them to save it from the wrecking ball. (The owners wanted to put a strip mall in).

Here is the dilapidated building from google.maps. May 2011. You can see the decorative "tooth" work above the windows and those 4 windows how they curve in at the top.  

The other day I drove past the address to find what I was expecting to be a torn down building as nothing in the news stated that the city had grated historical status. I found to my surprise a Tom N Tom Coffee. It’s one of the largest coffee houses in Korea. They had taken the entire two-floor building and converted it about 3 months ago. I still would love to see a plaque outside of it. One of my favorite things of Europe is that where ever you walk they have plaques saying what happen at that site or who lived at the location etc…

2009: LA Times Article to designate the building a landmark

http://articles.latimes.com/2009/feb/06/local/me-sees-candy6

2012: Fortune Article on Warren Buffett and See's

http://management.fortune.cnn.com/2012/08/22/sees-candies-buffett-berkshire

A Lady Born In Pasadena

Many times I need to pinch myself. Am I really here? What is going on? Don’t wake me up as I don’t want it to be over…

Last Saturday I was grateful to be asked by Pasadena Heritage to honor Julia Child. This would have been her 100^th Birthday. It was a garden party set in her former childhood home on Magnolia. Perfectly named street in fact.. It is lined with century old magnolia trees with blossoming flowers the size of dinner plates! 

A few years ago I was in New Zealand on a stop in Christchurch (a few days prior to their horrible earthquake). I met up with Stephanie Hersh (Julia’s long time personal assistant). We talked hours on end. I asked her if she knew if Julia’s childhood home was still standing. Stephanie mentioned that she and Julia drove around one afternoon and could not locate it. Thinking it had become a gas station.

Leave it to the Pasadena Heritage to have documentation that the house the McWilliams family owned is standing and information on two other homes that have influence on Julia growing up.

It was a very hot day over 100F. The lawn in front of the 1912 Colonial Revival home was outfitted with yellow draped tables and fresh summer flowers. I created the menu of Aperitifs. Simple Hors D’oeuvres and a bubbly drink.  Tory Topjian and his team of students from his bistro class prepped and waited tables.

I told about my first meeting with Julia in 1989 at a food conference and the many times we worked on projects together from ribbon cutting a new cooking school to teaching youth in the tenderloin district of San Francisco how to make pies. Besides the talk I put together a table of my 9 cookbooks that Julia had personalized over the years and two of the magazine covers she had adorned. Plus my prize possessions.. A copper pot, a blending fork and my 1993 “prom” picture of Julia and I together. 

Many times over the years I have felt Julia’s presents. Saturday was again one of them.

Julias HomeStudents making the food

Outside Porch with Flag