Dear friends of Cooking on the Bay

I hope you have a very Merry Christmas, Happy Festive Season and a wonderful New Year in 2018.

And so another happy and busy year rolls by in the life of Cooking on the Bay.  I thank you all for cooking here with me - it has been most enjoyable meeting you and cooking together in 2017, renewing many old friendships and making new ones. 

My consistent joy in taking these cooking classes at Cooking on the Bay, is the pleasure in gathering around food, cooking and enjoying the tasty, well presented dishes you have cooked. 

This is most conducive to our convivial atmosphere, the friendly, happy and relaxed feeling in the class.  The experience after the cooking, of dining with ‘new friends and old’, the good discussions, warm hearted fun and laughter, and generally, enjoying the food and companionship of others, makes my heart sing.

To you all, I wish the very best for happy and safe holidays and I look forward to welcoming you back soon to Cooking on the Bay.

A Cooking on the Bay Gift Voucher may well be your Christmas saviour!

• It is the gift that keeps on giving - you may well become the beneficiary of the new skills!

• Our cooking classes teach new skills, inspire, are sociable and suitable for nearly all ages, genders and skill levels.

• The recipient has a whole year to use the voucher.

• Our classes are fun and include eating and drinking as well as cooking.

You can purchase it online and I will immediately email you the Gift Voucher, information on the Cooking School, the Cooking Day, the Class Program for next year, plus a couple of recent articles about us. All this means you can shop at any time, or leave it until the last minute and don't have to leave the house!

After much popular demand, I am delighted to say, I am adding a few new classes  to our Cooking School Program for 2018.  The French Bistro Desserts cooking class will include such delights as the famous Tart Tatin, plus many more to whet your taste buds.  Desserts such as Oeufs a la Neige,  souffles, creme caramel, chocolate fondants, hazelnut dacquoise and the grand Chocolate Concorde.

• French Bistro Desserts - Sunday 4th March
• Spanish Cuisine inspired from the Camino - Sunday 18th March
• Moroccan  Exotic Spice Adventures - Cooking with Spices - Saturday 10th and Sunday 11th February

These are dates for the first set of classes; more will be added later. You will find the Cooking Class Program for 2018 at the end of this email. More dates will be added in January. 

A great dessert for summer and the festive season. This year, cherries appear to be abundant and the colours of the cherries look glorious.  You can prepare it all beforehand and cook it for about 20 minutes, just before serving.  To serve, add a dollop of Chantilly Cream and some of our Cooking on the Bay vanilla bean ice cream and scatter around extra berries, then dust with icing sugar. Here it is served with a cranberry jelly. You will find the Clafoutis recipe on the website Recipe Collection and the jelly on our Cooking on the Bay Facebook page.

This year my travels were all land based with just a pop in visit to the Betty B.  Travelling around Sardinia, on buses, trains and planes was a great experience and we enjoyed some wonderful food, especially in San Lussurgiu whre we spent four idyllic days at the'albergo diffuso' a boutique historic hotel in the centre of this tiny town.

San Sebastien lived up to its reputation with countless pintxos bars  providing an amazing variety of tantalising plates.  Just out of San Sebastien, I had lunch at the Michelin starred Asador Etxebarri, in the tiny village of Atxondo, in the Basque Country.  Etxebarri was voted 6th best in the world in Restaurant Top 50 Awards 2015. Chef Victor Arguinzoniz, who is famous for cooking everything over a grill, very kindly gave me a tour of his kitchen.  A year or so ago,  Australia Chef, Lennox Hastie, spent time at Etxebarri learning al about the art of cooking over the grill.  It was a truly memorable lunch and day.

Walking part of the Camino, for one week only, was a 'divine' expereince.  It transports you back through the centures as you walk along trails walked by pilgrims for hundreds of years.  Visiting beautiful, quaint villages and churhces along the Way enhances this very spiritual journey and to our surprise we ate some great Spanish food in this ancient Basque country.

Finally, Michael and I spent some time in France, as is usual!  This time, however, we were not barging along on the Betty B, we took a road trip briefly through Champagne, mainly to collect some Champagne, and then on to Burgundy for the remaining 2 and half weeks.  I have written lots about these adventures on Facebook; how we enjoyed some sensational food in Michelin starred restaurants, followed canals and rivers to discover the perfect marina, plus a few visits for me to the pilgrim sites of Cluny, Vezelay and Le Puy-en-Vealy.  More stories will be written over January about the food, restaurants and markets visited along our route.  The purpose of this raod trip was to find a new home for the Betty B in some pretty and safe marina which will be our French home for the next few years.

I am so excited about my January reading; it is a time I catch up on those things it is hard to do during the usual working week.  For those of you who are interested, these are a few of the books I will take with me to Kureelpa for my summer reading. I might have to book an extra suitcase!  All these fabulous books have been given to me by my dear food loving friends. So a big thank you to you all.

‘A Paris year: my day to day adventures in the most romantic city in the world’, by Janice McLeod, given to me by Dagmar Pennington.
‘A kitchen in France’, by Mimi Thorisson with recipes.
‘Acquatcotta: recipes and stories from Tuscany’s secret silver coast’ by Emiko Davies.
‘The surprising life of Constance Spry’, by Sue Shephard.
‘Champagne: how the world’s most glamorous wine triumphed over war and hard times’, by Don and Petie Kladstrup.
‘A revolution in taste: the rise of French Cuisine’, by Susan Pickard.
‘Dearie: the remarkablelife of Julia Child’, by Bob Spritz.
“Auguste Escoffier: memoirs of my life’, by Auguste Escoffier, with an introduction by Julia Child.

Program of Cooking Classes for 2018

Sunday classes are added when the Saturday classes are fully booked

Private classes available on request for groups of 6+

February – Saturday 3rd - French Odyssey – Journey through France

February – Thursday 8th - Mediterranean – Touch of Spice

February – Saturday 10th – Moroccan Exotic Spice Cooking
February – Sunday 11th – Moroccan Exotic Spice Cooking

February – Thursday 15th - Italianicious – Cooking with Passion
February – Saturday 17th - Italianicious – Cooking with Passion

February – Sunday 18th – Mastery in the Kitchen – Stocks, sauces and soups - Masterclass

February – Saturday 24th - Taste of Melbourne – Modern Australian Cuisine

March – Saturday 3rd - French Odyssey – Journey through France
March – Sunday 4th – French Bistro Desserts

March – Monday 12th - Labour Day – Moomba Holiday

March – Saturday 17th - Mediterranean – A Touch of Spice
March – Sunday 18th – Spanish Cuisine inspired on the Camino

March – Saturday 24th - Italianicious – Cooking with Passion

Easter – March 30th – Tuesday 3rd April

April – Thursday 12th - A French Odyssey – Journey through France
April – Saturday 14th - A French Odyssey – Journey through France

April – Thursday 19th - Taste of Melbourne – Modern Australian Cuisine
April – Saturday 21st - Taste of Melbourne – Modern Australian Cuisine

April -  Sunday 22nd - Mastery in the Kitchen – Stocks, sauces and soups

April – Saturday 29th - A French Odyssey – Journey through France

May – Thursday 3rd - Mediterranean – A Touch of Spice
May – Saturday 5th - Mediterranean – A Touch of Spice

May – Thursday 10th - Italianicious – Cooking with Passion
May – Saturday 12th - Italianicious – Cooking with Passion

May – Thursday 17th - Taste of Melbourne – Modern Australian Cuisine
May – Saturday 19th - Taste of Melbourne – Modern Australian Cuisine

May – Thursday 24th – A French Odyssey – Journey through France
May – Saturday 26th – A French Odyssey – Journey through France

May – Thursday 31st - Mediterranean – A Touch of Spice

June – Saturday 2nd - Mediterranean – A Touch of Spice

June – Monday 11th – Labour Day