This is a slightly different food blog this time as it isn't a restaurant. I bought my dad for his birthday present a day to Jamie Oliver's cookery class in Nottinghill; Recipease. They offer many different classes from bread making, pasta, chocolate, Mexican, Thai and many more! I decided to go for the Vietnamese Street Food lesson as Vietnamese food is something my dad hasn't tried to cook yet and I knew he would love it! The classes range from £30-50 a head and you get a 2 hour lesson. They are definitely worth the price and are so much fun! It has a shop too where you can buy Jamie's cookware and food! This lesson we had to make; Vietnamese Pork Balls with Dipping Sauce, Summer Rolls and Beef Pho.
The recipes you can find here: http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipease/files/5613/6136/1805/Vietnamese_street_food.pdf
The lesson starts with a quick tour of the kitchen and you get offered a glass of white or red wine, beer or soft drinks that comes complimentary.
You then stand around the main station watching the chef doing the first parts- you have to remember what she is doing!
You are given a station that share between 2 of you- that includes a chopping board, a board with your ingredients and an induction hob.
She started by preparing the pork balls- they take a while to cook. She explained that we had to finely chop lemongrass, garlic, shallots and chillies and grind them in a pestle and mortar and grind it to a smooth paste.
You then add this mixture to the minced pork and mix well. Add honey, oil, fish sauce and ground up palm sugar and salt and pepper to meat and using hands- mix well. You then have to make them into balls using your hands, shaping as you go.
You put them into a cold pan- (this was a new technique I learnt!) with a little oil and let them cook as the pan heats up.
Keep turning them over every couple of minutes so they are brown each side. You serve them on lettuce leaves with the dipping sauce.
We then started preparing the summer rolls- I used a new ingredient for these: rice paper rounds! They start off hard, but you have to soak them in water until they go soft and easy to handle.
We then cut vegetables very thinly with some basil, coriander and any other herbs you wish! Once you have dipped the rice paper in the water you arrange the vegetables and herbs into a small handful placed in the middle of the rice paper with some vermicelli noodles. You then fold up the bottom and top and roll tightly to make a parcel.
We lastly made the beef pho which is a clear soup that is pretty spicy! The recipe for this is here: http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipease/files/5613/6136/1805/Vietnamese_street_food.pdf This can be as spicy as you wish, deepening on how long you leave the chilli cooking for. You pretty much use beef stock and add as many vegetables as you like with sugar and coriander.
You then lay everything out on a wooden board and viola! Serve and eat.
The whole lesson is brilliant, you learn so many new skills and ingredients. Fantastic and the food was delicious! 100% worth the money and I want to try all the lessons.
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