• Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Alice Dishes

Adventures and Real Food

  • Design
  • Life
  • Recipes
  • Reviews
  • Travel

August 25, 2016

A Day At The San Sebastian Food Cooking School

After our trip to the La Brexta Market, armed with groceries, we head back to the wonderful, gleaming basement kitchen of the San Sebastian Food cooking school where our chefs and teachers await. We don white overalls and black aprons, scrub our hands and each take a prep station, waiting to hear what’s on the menu.

DSC_0415

It’s an ambitious and complex line-up, as you’d expect from a cooking school in the heart of Basque Country – a gastronomic wonderland. From simply but beautifully, prepared local appetizers, like local green peppers and uncured chorizo sausage, to a steamed vegetable medley and squid stuffed with lime infused apples.

Our guides in the San Sebastian Food kitchen are Agustín and Mateus. Both are experienced restaurant chefs who enjoy sharing what they’ve learned with wannabes like us, they’re generous with their knowledge and answer all our questions.

IMG_4656

The kitchen itself is exceptionally well equipped, for the most part with appliances from European manufacturer, Neff. Induction stove tops allow for precision cooking. A steamer which looks like a regular oven. Blow torches, a blast chiller and more.

Here are five tidbits I learned during the day.

1. It’s Probably Time to Get a Vacuum Sealer

Vacuum sealing machines, are not only a prerequisite for using a sous vide machine, but also for infusing flavors, and keeping food fresher longer. As part of the preparations for our squid dish, we did an insane (to me) experiment where we packed julienned pieces of apple with fresh lime juice, vacuum sealed the packaging and left to sit for a while. After a short period of time, we tasted the apples. They looked like apples, but tasted like lime. Mind. Blowing. And yet so simple… which I came to discover during our time in Spain is what sets apart good cooking from gastronomy.

Veggies ready to be prepped before being vacuum packed and steamed.

Veggies ready to be prepped before being vacuum packed and steamed.

2. And You’ll Need A Sous Vide To Accompany That Vacuum Sealer

Chef Mateus is a firm believer that in just a short few years most domestic kitchens will have a sous vide – or water bath. On many menus around San Sebastian we saw dishes that incorporated the perfect egg – cooked to 62 degrees Celsius – so that both egg and white are perfectly coagulated. And it’s great for cooking meat to perfection too.

3. A Squid’s Backbone Looks Like Glass

I’ve never cooked much fish at home—although I am told the secret is a super hot pan—but now I know how to prepare and clean squid perhaps I’ll try this dish at home. We were taught how to remove the head and insides, along with the clear backbone, which looks like it’s made of glass.

FullSizeRender

The backbone of a squid.

4. Using a Blow Torch Is A Lot of Fun

The dessert on our menu is a local favorite: individual pieces of bread pudding, made with brioche and soaked in a milk custard, before being dusted in sugar and browned over a high heat. Extra sugar is sprinkled over the cut edges and then melted with a blow torch. Monkey did the honors and had a blast using this particular kitchen tool. We also used the blow torch to lightly brown the pancetta before warming the tomatoes in the oven.

5. It’s All About The Plating

I’ve been to more than my fair share of cooking classes and in retrospect, plating has never featured on the curriculum, but not so at San Sebastian Food. Ensuring that the delicious food we have cooked is visually appealing, the chefs showed us how to plate each dish before we sat down to eat. Small touches such as adding a fresh flower or micro green (using tweezers) to garnish the dish, ‘schmearing’ the plate with a sauce by using a silicone pastry brush, and using a pastry cutter to make for perfect rounds of tomato, all made for really professional-looking dishes.

DSC_0451

Slightly warmed perfect rounds of fresh tomato topped with pancetta, sitting in tomato broth and olive oil.

 

DSC_0432

Local green peppers, fried and served with sea salt. One in ten in spicy!

DSC_0434

Delicious pan-friend mushrooms with garlic and parsley.

DSC_0465

Caramelized bread pudding with ice cream.

Other invaluable tips we picked up, include cooling cauliflower before putting it in the blender to avoid a watery result; freezing tomatoes and then using the resulting ‘tomato water’ from defrosting them as a delicate base to a dish, and scattering a few crushed toasted nuts to a plate before plating your dessert. And, most importantly, how to pour the local wine: txakoli to “break” the bubbles and release flavor.

All in all, we had an amazing time with the gang at San Sebastian Food. Our class started at 10.30am, with the tour to the market and the prep time in the kitchen, it was going on 2.30pm before we started eating our appetizers: pan-fried green peppers, delicious sausage and garlic and parsley mushrooms. And then we got to work finishing the cooking for our four courses: delicious warmed tomatoes with pancetta; perfectly steamed seasonal vegetables with pinenut dressing; squid stuffed with lime apples on pureed cauliflower and the aforementioned carmelized bread pudding.

At around 4pm we stumbled back out into the sunlight, replete and full of knowledge. I definitely hope to return to San Sebastian Food in the future, and look forward to using my new skills at home.

Filed Under: Reviews, Travel Tagged With: Basque Country, San Sebastian, San Sebastian Food, sous vide, Spain, vacuum

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Will says

    September 28, 2016 at 8:53 am

    just got a magimix – imagine her surprise when I install a sous vide.. 😉

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

About Alice

A bit about me... I grew up in the UK and moved to Northern California in the late 1990s, drawn here, like so many others, by the lure of ...

Read More

Popular Posts

  • holey_grail_donutsThe Best Places to Eat in Hanalei, Kauai
  • 10 Things to Do in Sea Ranch, CA10 Things to Do in Sea Ranch, CA
  • When All Is Said And Done: 7 Things That Really Matter in LifeWhen All Is Said And Done: 7 Things That Really…
  • Stunning Beet and Cauliflower SoupStunning Beet and Cauliflower Soup

People are Talking About

No People Food

A Lesson in Salt From Samin Nosrat

Madeleines by Monkey

When All Is Said And Done: 7 Things That Really Matter in Life

Alice’s Favorites

101 Cookbooks
Chef on a Mission
Cook, Taste, Eat
Food Politics
Golden
Good Eggs
Healthy Cooking
Jamie Oliver Food Revolution
Mary Vance
Michael Pollan
Nina Planck
Not Without Salt
Nourish Network
Samin Nosrat
The Healthy Home Economist

alicedishes

Lover of life, Labs & horses. Visit AliceDishes.com blog for travel, recipes, design & life. Area VI #morganhorse #blacklab #eventing #interiors

Alice Dishes. Eat, Bark, Ride
Roger was a very good boy yesterday to get a 75.6 Roger was a very good boy yesterday to get a 75.6 at our local schooling show 😍 #dressage
This boy is teaching me so much. And I love the fa This boy is teaching me so much. And I love the fact he always has his ears forward and is enjoying his job again. Excited to head to @horseparkatwoodside to show him next weekend for the first time in a year. He’s ready!! #eventinghorse #areavi
Staying alive and getting it done on xc - so much Staying alive and getting it done on xc - so much fun 🤩 #areavi #eventinghorse #morganmare
A little bit of our dressage and SJ action from th A little bit of our dressage and SJ action from the weekend @twinrivershorsepark - Q and I were either great or mediocre during dressage to give us a 36.4 which made it hard to be competitive, but the goal was to finish on our dressage score and feel confident all weekend ✅. We moved up 4 places over the weekend and jumped double clear in both SJ and XC for a top 10 finish. Our rhythm and timing in SJ was probably our best yet. #eventing #areavi #comeback
The sunset was spectacular last night in Paso Robl The sunset was spectacular last night in Paso Robles! #sunset #pasorobles
So fun to watch @tommygreengard on these two speci So fun to watch @tommygreengard on these two special boys: Barry and Josh. 😍
The boy is back in town! Rogee had a blast doing X The boy is back in town! Rogee had a blast doing XC schooling for the first time since February. He was relaxed (shocker!), said yes to everything and although he wanted to shred up the track he listened and was a very good boy 😍😍😍 - so happy with him and I think he had the best day ever 🙌  Looking forward to showing him at @woodsidehorsepark in Oct! #xc #eventing #eventinghorse
My little pocket 🚀 was on 🔥today! I couldn’t have been happier. We jumped all the Training things and tackled some challenging questions. We’ve had a lot of ups and downs since losing some confidence. At one point in June I froze jumping a x-rail 🤷‍♀️. But we have fought our way back, filling in gaps and ultimately our partnership has become even stronger. I’m so proud of her. I have lots of work to do to be fully deserving of this brave girl, but after a day like today it feels like we could conquer anything! (Except dressage 😂 - but we are working on that too!) #eventing #eventinghorse #xc #morganmare #comeback
Fun working on our jumping at home today 1) no st Fun working on our jumping at home today 
1) no stirrups 2) trot verticals 3) adjust canter 4) work a related distance ✅. Felt great. She was keen and took me to the fences 😍 #eventinghorse #morganmare
🎉 New blog post alert! My first story about our 🎉 New blog post alert! My first story about our trip to the Baja peninsula is live - link in bio.  Read all about the fun we had staying and tequila tasting at  @thecapehotel, massages at @cabosurfhotel delicious food at @florafarms and @elhuertof2t  #bajacalifornia #vacationvibes #cabosanlucas #beachday @thecapehotel @florafarms @cabosurfhotel
My handsome boy. The many faces of King Arthur. #b My handsome boy. The many faces of King Arthur. #blacklab #blacklabrador
I would choose them both every time. It’s defin I would choose them both every time.  It’s definitely not easy having two horses and one rider. But I am going to make it work as long as I possibly can because they are part of me. 😍 Can you have two ❤️ horses for different reasons? Because I might have just got that lucky.
It makes me so happy to see Rogee fit, strong and It makes me so happy to see Rogee fit, strong and enjoying his rehabbed body. He’s really learning what he’s can do with himself these days physically and it’s also really rewarding to see his personality shift down a few gears to a generally more relaxed state… #goodboy
I planted these at the end of April - and finally I planted these at the end of April - and finally I get my first harvest!!
Burghley Revisited. What a terrific time we had. # Burghley Revisited. What a terrific time we had. #eventing #5* #burghleyhorsetrials
Load More Follow on Instagram

Footer

A bit about me... I grew up in the UK and moved to Northern California in the late 1990s, drawn here, like so many others, by the lure of the dot.com ...

Read More

More to Explore

All Posts Archive

Stay Connected

  • Email
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • RSS
  • Twitter

Never Miss a Post

Copyright© 2023 · Alice Dishes

website by lobstervine