Cook School by Martin Wishart

Hubby spoilt me rotten this Christmas and bought me a gift voucher to one of the classes run by Martin Wishart's Cook School. I was thrilled to bits but if I'm honest, a part of me was a little bit scared as well. A Michelin star cook school - eeek!

I chose to do the Dessert and Baking course (naturally!) which is run one day every second month, the menu changes according to the season's and today we made;

• Lemon Tart with Macerated Raspberries
• Gingerbread



• Poached Peaches with Rosemary Cream (Pannacotta to you and me!)
• Apricot and Almond Tart with Creme Friache

(please excuse the general lack of photo's - I was a bit too self conscious to whip the camera out for this one!)

And for lunch we got Steamed Fillet of Sea Bream with Glazed Vegetable Straw Potatoes and Vinaigrette Gourmand - not actually made it to Martin's restaurant for a meal as yet but after that lunch I'm defo going to move it to the top of the list! It was brilliant and the fish was so tender - yum, yum, YUM!!

We had two Chefs who took us through the recipes, each was demonstrated before we got to go back to our own workstations and do it for ourselves. They gave us little Michelin star type hints and tips along the way as well that never seem to go in the recipe books! And while I was apprehensive to start off with, in the end the recipes were so straight forward I'm not quite sure why I was ever too scared to make a pannacotta or lemon tart before now. We ate the panncotta for dessert after the fantastic Sea Bream and I was so pleased at how creamy and smooth it was (please excuse my lack of modesty). Nothing worse than a grainy pannacotta!

Lemon Tart scared me a lot before now too, possibly because the likes of Gordon Ramsay and Marcus Wearing say that it is the lemon tart that can make or break a restaurant and will test the worth of the pastry chef. No pressure there then! But once we were shown the basics and let loose on our own I soon got over the fears and it turned out pretty good, very zingy and fresh and the raspberries were out of this world.

We were given all the different bits and pieces that were left over to bring home with us as well as the finished articles that didn't get eaten throughout the day. I've got pastry, lemon tart filling, frangipane, gingerbread mixture, poached peaches and apricots and pannacotta which can be melted down in a bain marie and reset in the proper moulds. Brilliant value for money.

I did have a slight disaster on the way home though, the sugar syrup that the peaches and apricots were poached in decided to leak all through the paper bag. I had just enough time to get it home before the bottom fell out of the bag. Thankfully the only casualty was the lemon tart, it ended up with a big crack through the center of the filling. Hubby was quite happy to rectify this mishap by devouring so that no evidence was left of my little disaster!