A trip down Memory Lane...

It's hard to believe that it's been almost three years since we opened the doors to Urban Kitchen.
So...I had to grab a little excerpt from one of my posts from 2010 before it all happened...makes me a little nostalgic and just a bit incredulous that we actually did it.
Here's a little blast from the past:

Next...the kitchen is coming together in spite of all of the crazy things that have happened from the vent hood installers cannibalizing my hood fans to figuring out the new heat sensor requirements to...well, I'm sure there's something else but I can't think of what it is.  Here is a picture of the kitchen...not the same one as on Facebook so a little variety coming atcha...
On the food front...I just read that legendary Chef Alain Ducasse has expressed himself on the subject of complicated food and he says...it's too damn complicated!  YAY!! Thank you so much!!  In fact, he is completely reworking his menu and is going so far as to limit all items to three ingredients.  That just speaks to my heart after all this silly, self-absorbed, overly complex cooking that's going on out there!  So...as I have always said, delicious, honest food, completely identifiable that you can be passionate about.
We will start being passionate about the food we cook very shortly at Urban Kitchen on Cherry Street...can't wait to share with everyone...I will be scheduling cooking classes in November!

So, actually, we didn't schedule cooking classes in November of 2010 because the Health Department insisted on a particular kind of floor drain under my three compartment sink that required additional plumbing and tearing up of the tile.  Oh yeah, and did I mention that while I was at it, I needed to put in a grease trap?  Lord help me, I don't know how any of us survive the food business with all of the "help" we get from the city.  We also didn't get a break from the weather gods either with one of the worst winters on record (exception being the ice storm of 2009) so I think we started classes in the Spring of 2011.

But now, three years later and lots of experiences under my belt here is little Urban Kitchen on Cherry Street where we're cooking fearlessly...one recipe and a time!
And, oh yeah, again...Chef Alain Ducasse is still my hero!

And as always...
If you like this post, SHARE it on Facebook, Twitter or with someone you think needs to see it! 
Come join the fun and take a class with us!  
Visit my website at Urban Kitchen on Cherry Street and check out the Class Calendar.

And, if personalizing your cooking and making it fun is interesting to you, you might enjoy my Complete Resource Guide to Stress-Free Entertaining.   Check it out by clicking on the link....it's free!

It IS entertaining...

So what if I told you, anybody can be successful at entertaining?  Already scoffing at me, eh?
OK...what if I told you that you can not only be successful at entertaining but can also enjoy it?  How about that one?  I hope, at this point, that you're intrigued enough to keep reading or...you have decided that I have completely gone 'round the bend on this one.  But hear me out!
Personally, I have always enjoyed entertaining.  My mom was a great hostess on the order of Perle Mesta.  How's that for a very old, obscure reference?  How many of you even know who Perle Mesta was?  And, yes, I know I'm dating myself!

Suffice it to say, my mom was a superb entertainer.  She and my dad would have holiday open houses where hundreds of people would come and go over several hours in an entire evening,  It was a true open house, in every sense of the word, back in the good old (bad old?) days of the 1960's.  Copious amounts of food and adult beverages as well as the occasional romantic tryst in the coat closet with people not married to one another.  Yes, definitely the good old days!  HAH!  Anywho, my mother managed to prepare most all of the food but then hired people to help serve and bartend so that she could be "the hostess with the mostest" at my father's side.  Those parties and her aplomb associated with them were my introduction to Entertaining...I was going to say 101 but there was nothing simple or introductory about the way my mother captained that ship.  So, I internalized my maternal rendering of Martha Stewart and thought that was what I needed to do.  And, I did!  I loved throwing great parties that totally stressed me out but they were perfect and beautiful.  I loved them but I couldn't say they were "fun" for me.  Everyone else had a wonderful time, though.  I guess the question is...how did I get from there to here?  Here being the place where I not only enjoy but have put together a lovely stress-free evening.

The "aha" moment came over twenty years ago when I was running behind getting things together for a small dinner party and was, of course, completely panicked.  One of the couples arrived a bit early (that about put me over the edge but she was a very good friend) and she said, as she watched me race around, "well, it's so nice to see that you're human."  That was my tipping point!  Indeed, I am human and why not stop trying to be Martha Stewart (who at the time had a staff of 700+) and actually enjoy the evening and my guests?  And, from that moment forward, that's exactly what I did and continue to do.

At Urban Kitchen, I teach cooking classes but I am also creating a warm and inviting environment that provides entertainment and something a little different for people to do together.  So I am entertaining guests in my kitchen anywhere from 3 to 5 nights a week.  We turn on the music, pour everyone a glass of wine and start cooking up some fun.  The atmosphere is light and easy.  No intimidation from complicated food, just delicious, straightforward dishes that are as comfortable to make as that old pair of slippers is to wear.

Now...do you believe that anyone can entertain AND enjoy doing it?  I hope so!
Keep an eye out because a complete guide of how-to do this whole entertaining thing is coming your way very soon!

And as always...
 If you liked this post, SHARE it on Facebook, Twitter or with someone you think needs to see it!
Come join the fun and take a class with us!  Visit my website at Urban Kitchen on Cherry Street and check out the Class Calendar.

To Cook or Not To Cook...or maybe the question is...

Here I go again...starting off with a weird title.
So I guess I need to explain...but first...thanks so much to everyone for their responses to my Super Simple Survey.  It gave me lots of food for thought, so to speak.

And, here's one of those thoughts - maybe it's not about the cooking or even the food, maybe what it's really about is how you go about the cooking and thinking about the food and the process.

Consider this...you get home from work and you are dead tired.  The last thing you want to think about is making something to eat.  Cooking sounds like a death sentence and certainly the last thing you would do for fun.  Dragging yourself into the kitchen to stare into the refrigerator or the pantry with those sunken eyes that just seem to spin in your head as you come up with, well, nothing.  Finally, you grab a cracker and a glass of water and go to bed.  If you have kids, you give them a cracker, too.  Well...I think I may have to go jump out the window myself...This kind of mindset leads to books like this!  YIKES!!!

How about an alternative scenario....you get home from work and yes, you are dead tired once more.  This time, you turn on some music, pour a glass of wine and head to the bedroom.  Now wait a minute...we are going back to the kitchen!  Change out of your work clothes into something more conducive to a relaxed and comfortable experience.  I know...yoga pants and flip flops!  Now, you return to the kitchen.  Slightly refreshed and certainly in a better frame of mind.  Instead of staring into the refrigerator for inspiration...because believe me, it does not exist inside that box, you consider what would make you feel good about this whole situation.  Sometimes it might be ordering pizza or Chinese takeout but let's stay with this vision of actually cooking something.  You remember some things that you have learned recently like...start with a meat or fish or even vegetable that you really like to eat, then you think about how to fix it so it tastes even better.  Maybe you do a quick saute in a little olive oil with garlic and onion and then make an even quicker pan sauce with one of your favorite herbs,a little wine (that you're drinking, of course) and finish it with a little butter or cream or cheese.  Then you stop to consider how great the music sounds, the wine tastes and how much better you're feeling.  Wow!  I already feel much better than that jumping out of the window thing.  Woohoo...we're having some fun, now!

No, I do not know who this person is but she sure is happy!

See...it's really not about cooking or food...it's about the attitude.  You can cook anything and make it a pain or you can make it a pleasure.  Let me give you another example...
When you watch cooking shows or just watch people cook...it's boring, right?  The actual cooking is super boring.  In my classes, when we have to wait for things to finish cooking....Lordy!  Takes for evah!  That's because nothing is happening except cooking.  So the reason we watch cooking shows or take cooking classes is to be entertained (not just to learn something although I like to think that you learn a little bit in my classes).  If you watch the online cooking courses, pick one, it doesn't matter which one, they're boring!  I want to poke my eyes out!  It isn't about the cooking or the food...it's about the person doing it.  Again, a fer instance...I would watch Michael Symon make mud...he could just mix dirt and water all day as far as I'm concerned because he's so cool and attitude...for days!  Not to mention, he's cute AND bald which is a huge bonus for me.  Now, when I watch him cook real food, do I learn anything?  Sometimes.  But he mostly cooks stuff I already know about so why do I watch?  Because of the "feel" of his show or the "feel" of how he cooks.  And, yes, he is cute and would probably be very fun to party with but I also watch Alex Guarnaschelli because of the " C" factor...not because she's cute.  Although, I think she would be fun to party with, too.

See what I mean?
Now, here's the rub.  In order to create the coolness factor, you've got to do A LOT of WORK and spend A LOT of TIME not to mention MONEY on cookbooks and cooking references and utensils and heavy equipment and food magazines and watching food shows with lots of trial and error involved.  Notice I didn't say anything about going to culinary school?  No, because you don't need to go to school to create this.  But you do need all this other stuff because you need to have your own library (for lack of a better word) to pull from.
What if someone did all that work FOR you?  What if all that information was in one spot for you to refer to without you doing much of anything?
I know...sounds crazy doesn't it?  And, since I am just a little crazy, I'm going to have an answer to those "what ifs" in the very near future. So keep the faith, baby.  Help is on its way...
And as always...
 If you liked this post, SHARE it on Facebook, Twitter or with someone you think needs to see it!

Come join the fun and take a class with us!  Visit my website at Urban Kitchen on Cherry Street and check out the Class Calendar.

And, if you haven't already...don't forget to read my July 4th post and answer The Girl's Super Simple Survey!

So...what do you do in a...pasta class?

I am often asked, "what happens in the pasta class?". 
Well, we don't just open the bag and throw it in the water...if that's what you mean!

The pasta classes at Urban Kitchen are some of the most popular and fun classes that we have.  Pasta is made from scratch using a basic two-egg dough that is easy for beginners to handle.  I admit we do not do the "flour on the board with a well for the eggs" method.  I prefer the food processor method; it's must less intimidating, it's fast and it works great! 
The pasta machine is a manual, hand-cranked version that usually requires two people so it is a fun team-building (or friend-building) exercise.  After the pasta is rolled out (if you don't have a pasta machine, you can use a rolling pin), you can cut it into all kinds of shapes.  The class favorite is bowties or farfalle.  We also make linguini.  And, everything is handcut so, yes, it's rustic!

Class includes two sauces; a marinara and then something else.  The marinara helps pass the time while we are allowing the pasta dough to rest (30 minutes).  Once made and laid out on sheet pans, pasta can be frozen or must be used immediately.  In class, we follow the "use immediately" program.  Fresh pasta cooks very quickly so once your water comes to a boil, be ready with a tool that will fish the pasta out easily...like a spider or some other slotted or wire tool.  The pasta then goes into a small amount of sauce that has been warmed in a saute pan to finish.  Remember, in Italy...it's all about the pasta, not the sauce.  Sauce is treated like a condiment.
So that's Pasta 101 in a nutshell...hope to see you in class!

What in the World is...? Food Cetera from November, 2010

NOVEMBER 2010
From the Urban Kitchen website (http://www.urbankitchentulsa.com/)
What in the world is...a parsnip?
Indeed! What is this new darling of the food world? You hear about it everywhere now but new? Not really...the parsnip has been around for hundreds of years when the Europeans brought it to the US in the early 1600s! For some reason, this creamy-white root has never become an American favorite...until now! Chefs across the country have taken up this overlooked little gem and are putting it into everything from cakes to mashed potatoes (actually using it INSTEAD of mashers).
Parsnips look a lot like carrots except, yes...they're white. They have a pleasantly sweet yet spicy flavor that goes well with many foods and enriches the flavor profiles of vegetable soups and stock as well as roasted meats, especially birds. No need to peel them because most of the flavor lies just beneath the skin so just give them a good scrub. Because of the sugar content, parsnips will caramelize nicely when roasted or baked but are good boiled or steamed and then mashed with butter and cream...yum!
Parsnips are available year-round but are best now and into winter. Choose small to medium, well-shaped roots that are not limp. They will keep in the fridge for up to 2 weeks.
So...be fearless! Try slicing parsnips into your next potato gratin, add them to your Thanksgiving mash, or just roast them in the oven with a little olive oil, butter, salt and pepper...and the rest of your winter vegetables.
Embrace the humble but lovely parsnip