Delicious. TEST REPORT

THE COOKERY SCHOOL

WHERE Four Gables Food Academy, Ashtead, Surrey (fourgablesfoodacademy.com)

THE COURSE Flavours of the Med, £130 for a half-day course (includes lunch with wine)

TESTED BY Isabeau Brimeau

Pesto

Shaping tortellini

Perfect scallops

Knife skills with peppers

RECIPE: ADAM BLANCHARD…FOOD STYLING: LOTTIE COVELL. PHOTOGRAPH: ALEX LUCK. STYLING: HANNAH WILKINSON

WHAT IT’S LIKE Tucked away in a village where the locals all seem to know one another lies a smallholding with converted stables that’s home to a few wandering pigs and sheep. Now a cookery school called Four Gables, it’s owned by chef David Gillott, who’s taken his experience of working in restaurants in London and the Alps and put it into running cookery courses in this pretty Surrey spot.

My fellow students and I were Welcomed in out of the grey, wet weather with a hot cuppa, then eased into a chat about everyone’s previous cooking experience. The school has a rustic modern vibe, with its wooden exterior, countryside location and portable induction hobs. I was pleased to discover there are a maximum of six students per class, so there’s no fighting over equipment.

WHAT I LEARNED Adam Blanchard, a former chef at Claridges in London, was our teacher for the day. He began with a demonstration on how to make focaccia – a favourite of mine. It rested, proved and baked in the background while we cooked our way through several other dishes: risotto (see right), pesto, falafel with tzatziki, and tortellini.

While the list of recipes may seem daunting (this is a half-day course, after all), a few of the dishes are partially prepared, allowing course-goers to focus on learning the technique and how to build flavour. The pesto was chunky and simple to make using a pestle and mortar – and, as I discovered later, wonderful with the focaccia. I didn’t mind that the potato and the chickpeas for the falafel had already been cooked and whizzed to a paste, as it was better to spend class time on less basic processes. The crux of the recipe – altering the seasoning to suit your taste and learning how to make tzatziki – was what I was keen to get stuck into.