My last night in Aix we went off to cooking school! L’atelier des Chefs on the rue Constantin, in the heart of Aix. The menu that evening was risotto and tiramisu…so how could I resist?

It is a cooking school, but they also sell kitchen equipment, and do catering.

First we started with the tiramisu: chopped the pears (!) and caramelized them.

Our wonderful chef/instructor mixing the puree de marron (chestnut) with marscapone cheese !! Yes, this was going to be good. 
More of our group assembling the individual tiramisu dishes.
I didn’t take many pictures here as I was too busy attending to my own cooking: watching, chopping, rinsing, sauteing etc.  But for the tiramisu, we layered the caramelized pears with the chestnut/cream mousse with a biscuit on the bottom, then rich cocoa sifted on top, and into the fridge. You will see the finished product below!
Moving on to the risotto:
Learning the correct way to chop onions!

Lots of saffron.

Sorry Delana, I know it’s blurry!
 We learned the correct way to clean and devein the shrimp…

It’s the details! Here we put shredded parmesan cheese inside a ring, ready to bake:
Perfect! Crisp and salty:

Assembling the dish, and decorating with this balsamic “spread”:

Oh YES!
Good enough to eat, right???

And the VERY best for last!
Ta da……. tiramisu. Yes indeed, these were gone in a flash.

This was really F U N. 
The courses are taught in either English or French, or a combination; the entire staff is so friendly and helpful; and they have schools in many cities in France.

Here’s a video from their website you might like!

Ready to sign up???