Step in the kitchen and think out of the recipe
The food was incredible, the company fun and the cost worth it.
The best part is, there they will give you the recipe.
The Love to Cook at Kitchen Kneads store on Main Street holds cooking classes four times a week said store owner Nancy Beykirch. The classes are Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday at 6:30 p.m. and Saturdays at 11 a.m. Cost per class starts at $5. Call ahead because reservations go quickly.
Beykirch said amateurs, professionals and everything in between come to classes.
“We have the very young to the extremely old,” Beykirch said.
Resident chef Bryan Woolley taught the How to Cook for Just One Person class on Feb. 17. He also does the cooking segment on FOX 13 News on Tuesdays in the 11 to noon hour.
For the class, the menu was meatloaf and chicken pot pies but Woolley threw in two salads for a surprise.
Woolley picked meatloaf and pot pies because he said these are two that most people don’t like because they haven’t made them properly.
“You’ll see how easy it is,” he said.
The class takes students from just learning recipes to learning techniques, said Woolley.
“You have to have a Diet Coke when you cook,” Woolley said, highly recommending the new lime flavor.
“Don’t just settle for regular hamburger, that’s pretty boring,” Woolley said about choosing meat for the loaf.
“Have you seen what they grind into hamburger?” asked Woolley, who takes special care to grind his own hamburger. “Enough said.
“My meatloaf is very unconventional,” he said.
For the bread crumbs he used Kitchen Knead’s own homemade bread.
“If you have never tried the whole wheat bread at Kitchen Kneads, you must,” Woolley said.
He also uses only freshly grated Parmesan cheese.
Woolley gives his class the recipes but adds things as they make it.
“When people come to class they get the real recipe,” he said.
Two of the students in the class were Kyle Gertz, a student at Utah State University, and his friend Ashley Pitcher.
Gertz’s mom bought him the classes for Christmas and this was his first time. Gertz has experience in cooking because he works for Callaway’s Italian restaurant as a deliverer.
His greatest advice for cooking?
“Never fry bacon naked,” Gertz said.
Pitcher said she lives with her grandmother and cooks every night for her.
“She’s a picky eater,” she said.
One of Woolley’s strongest pieces of advice for cooking alone is to plan ahead and to decide how long the food will keep.
“Don’t get caught up and eat Pop Tarts and Lucky Charms like me,” Woolley said.
He said cooking for yourself is difficult and not very fun.
For shopping for the single person he said, “Sam’s Club is not an option [for single people] but you may want to rummage through their samples.
“I’m not a happy camper with Wal-Mart,” Woolley said.
He went there and then went to Albertson’s and compared his receipts. He said there’s not a big price difference at all.
If dieting is an issue, Woolley recommends cooking for yourself. He said people ask him how he can be a chef and be so skinny.
“If people in general would take time to cook we wouldn’t have the serious health problems we have now,” Woolley said.
Woolley told the class not to be afraid to try different things, although he added, “I always have twinges of fear things are not going to work right.”
He made toffee on an episode of FOX 13 news and it all turned to sugar he said.
“Then I just say it’s from Germany.”
Pitcher and Gertz said they both enjoyed the class. Pitcher said she will definitely try the recipes. Her favorite was the chicken pot pie.
The Kitchen Kneads store is at 1211 N. Main St. and the store’s Web site is luvtocook.com.
-mdymock@cc.usu.edu