Cooking and Woodworking Combo Courses
hot tamales
ratatouille
Mexican fried cheese with
tomato broth and epazote
Hungarian pork pörkölt
As Hendrik's cooking instruction business, Passion for Food, continues to grow, he is meeting more and more customers who are interested in both cooking and woodworking. Many of his long time woodworking customers are now asking Hendrik to cook for a dinner party while at their home for a stint of woodworking instruction. So Hendrik will spend several days in your workshop teaching you woodworking skills and fine tuning your equipment, but then also spend a couple of afternoons and evenings teaching you about Mexican food, Hungarian food, or other dishes that you will enjoy. If your spouse or partner is not interested in the woodworking part of the course but is really into food and cooking, it can be a great way to enjoy at least part of the course as a couple. In fact, it might encourage one spouse to join you in the workshop while you join him or her in the kitchen as well, making for a very rich learning opportunity for both of you.
Since this sort of cooking and woodworking combination is becoming more popular, Hendrik is formalizing it by now offering specifically designed cooking and woodworking combination courses. These can be done in your own home or here in Hendrik's own kitchen and workshop. Here is how it works. Each morning, you spend four hours in the kitchen cooking several dishes with Hendrik, learning about new ingredients and how to use them and increasing your knife skills along the way. This is generally done from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. At the end of this time, you will sit down with Hendrik and enjoy the prepared food over the lunch break. Then, from 2:00 to 6:00 p.m., you will join Hendrik in his workshop where you will work on a woodworking project or hone your skills learning techniques such as sharpening hand planes and chisels, handcut dovetails, mortise and tenon joinery and more. What could be better? A combination of woodworking instruction and cooking instruction, along with a delicious lunch you prepared yourself, all rolled into one incredible learning experience.
This cooking and woodworking combination course can be done one-on-one, as Hendrik often does when teaching either woodworking or cooking separately. However, it really excels as a couples course as well. If you and your significant other spend a week or two cooking all morning and woodworking all afternoon you won't believe just how incredible the experience is. It's not just about the learning, but it's also about the bonding opportunity that only comes by sharing each other's interests. So perhaps your partner is more interested than you in woodworking and you are more interested in cooking. If you can convince each other to embark on this learning journey together, you'll gain an understanding of each other unlike anything else you've experienced before. Sharing one's hobbies sets you up for a life with shared meaning.
And this is not just for couples. This course would also be a wonderful bonding opportunity for mother/son, mother/daughter, father/son, father/daughter or simply best friends -- any pairing that has meaning to you.
While there are unlimited options for customized woodworking instruction based on Hendrik's "buffet-style customized intensive courses", Hendrik has now formalized two project-based intensive woodworking courses that can be combined with cooking instruction in the morning. One course runs for 5 days while the other runs for 10 days. Courses generally run from Monday to Friday, so if you take a 10 day course you'll have a Saturday and Sunday in the middle of the course to explore Toronto, Niagara Falls or other nearby attractions.
Here is a brief description of each course length:
5 Day Cooking/Woodworking Combination Course
In this course, you'll spend your mornings cooking some incredible Mexican, Hungarian or other foods, including desserts. In the afternoon, you'll work on Hendrik's "Arc Supported Shelves" project. At the end of this 5 day course, you'll have over a dozen incredible recipes to take home with you, as well as this fine woodworking project to hang on your wall at home. Your family and friends will not believe that you built this sleek, modern project with your own hands. This woodworking project will teach you about:
- Safe use of the table saw, including ripping and cross-cutting techniques.
- Milling your own lumber using the jointer and thickness planer.
- “Reading” the grain direction to determine proper milling and hand-planing direction.
- Cutting precise dado joints to support the shelves.
- Working with thin stock to make the arc pieces.
- Safe use of the router table.
- Drilling holes on the drill press.
- Accurately installing hanging hardware.
- Proper use of a random orbit sander.
- Hand sanding.
- Gluing and assembly skills.
- Finishing with Danish oil and mixing your own Danish oil/polyurethane blend. (1 coat only during course)
10 Day Cooking/Woodworking Combination Course
In the 10 day course, you'll master between two and three dozen recipes during your morning cooking sessions. And in the afternoons you'll build Hendrik's "Cherry Side Table with Tapered, Fluted Legs" project. You'll learn the following skills:
- Safe use of the table saw, including ripping and cross-cutting techniques.
- Milling your own lumber using the jointer and thickness planer.
- “Reading” the grain direction to determine proper milling and hand-planing direction.
- Proper gluing techniques, including edge gluing and face gluing.
- Making strong dowel joints. (The joinery connecting the legs and aprons will be dowel joinery. Mortise-and-tenon joinery is an advanced joinery technique available if the student is so inclined, but will add more time and cost to the course.)
- Safe use of the router, both hand-held and in a router table.
- Routing flutes, chamfers and decorative beads.
- Making tapered legs on the table saw.
- Proper methods for attaching a table top to the leg/apron assembly.
- Hand-planing techniques to flatten a glued-up panel.
- Proper use of a random orbit sander.
- Hand sanding.
- Gluing the leg/apron assembly together.
- Finishing with Danish oil and mixing your own Danish oil/polyurethane blend. (1 coat only during course)
For the cooking sessions, Hendrik will give you suggestions on how to structure the daily menu. There are too many dishes to list here, but you can see photos of his repertoire on the various pages of the "Passion for Food" website: see http://passionforwood.com/cooking/ . Hendrik suggests that the menu each day consist of one appetizer, one main dish and one dessert. There might be two appetizers from time to time, if one of them is a salsa or some other dish that is easy to make. Some salsas are quick and easy, while others can be quite complex. Also, some dishes such as cabbage rolls or pierogies take a long time to prepare, so you will not have time for three dishes for some menu selections.
Mexican shrimp ceviche with
cucumber, avocado and hot sauce
Mexican salmon a la Veracruzana
Mexican chocolate flan
with caramel sauce
potato pancakes with spicy
stewed tomato salsa
chicken paprikash with nokedli
Hungarian poppyseed roll
(makosh)
hickory smoked pork ribs
apple cheese salad with walnuts
Here are just a few menu items for you to choose from involving Mexican cuisine:
Appetizers/Side Dishes:
Salsa Mexicana with Freshly Fried Tortilla Chips
Salsa Verde Cruda with Freshly Fried Tortilla Chips
Salsa Roja with Guajillos, Chiles de Arbol and Tomatillos
4-Pepper Salsa Roja
Fried Cheese with Tomato and Poblano Chile Sauce
Pico de Gallo
The Best Guacamole You've Ever Had
Shrimp Ceviche
Frijoles Borrachos (pinto beans with cilantro, bacon and tequila)
Frijoles Refritos (Fried Beans)
Mexican Red Rice
Fresh Wheat Flour and Corn Flour Tortillas
Mole Poblano (extra time required)
Main Courses
Mango Avocado Salad with Bacon, Cheese and Pepitas
Shredded Flank Steak Salad with Potatoes and Avocado
Shrimp Ball Soup
Bean and Tortilla Soup
Posole Rojo
Enchiladas Rojas
Salmon a la Veracruzana
Battered Fish Tacos with Cabbage and Chipotle Crema
Sopes
Chicken Pibil Wrapped in Banana Leaves
Huevos Rancheros
Chilaquiles Rojos
Pork Shoulder Tamales (extra time required)
Desserts
Vanilla Flan (crème caramel) with Caramel Sauce
Chocolate Flan with Caramel Sauce
Chocoflan with Cajeta ("The Impossible Cake")
Rice Pudding
Rum Custard Ice Cream
Pineapple Skillet Upside Down Cake
Super Light Cheese Pie with Mexican Chocolate Sauce
Buñuelos
Gelatina de Tres Leches
Coconut Custard with Almonds
Plantain with Rum Butter Sauce
Here are just a few menu items for you to choose from involving Hungarian cuisine:
Appetizers/Side Dishes:
Shaved Cucumber Salad
Sweet & Sour Coleslaw
Dill Potato Salad
Warm Bacon Potato Salad
Parsley Potatoes
Nokedli (Hungarian dumplings)
Liver Dumplings
Potato Pancakes
Potato Cakes (Krumplislangos)
Hungarian Mashed Potatoes
Lesco (sautéed peppers, tomatoes, onions and garlic with kolbassa and spices)
Braised Red Cabbage
Main Courses
Goulash
Bean and Smoked Ham Hock Soup
White Bean Soup
Chicken Soup with Fine Noodles
Potato Soup
Pot Roast
Chicken Paprikash
Wiener Schnitzel
Cabbage Rolls (extra time required)
Stuffed Peppers
Chicken and Rice
Cabbage and Noodles
Cheese & Potato Pierogies (extra time required)
Desserts
Sweet Pierogies (stuffed with homemade prune jam) (extra time required)
Walnut Roll (dios)
Poppyseed Roll (makosh)
Apple Cake
Kalachki (jam filled cookies)
Crepes (palacsinta)
Apple Cinnamon Strudel (made with phyllo pastry)
Kipfels
Kalacs (sweet Easter bread)
Roasted Pears with Pistachios
Dobos Torte (with chocolate buttercream) (extra time required)
Sacher Torte (extra time required)
Here are just a few menu items for you to choose from involving other types of cuisine:
Appetizers/Side Dishes:
Argentinian Chimichurri Sauce
Spinach Salad with Mandarin Oranges and Pine Nuts
Sautéed Bruschetta on French Baguette
Grandma's Stuffing
Smashed Potatoes
Sweet Potato and Carrot Soup with Maple Cream
Apple, Cheese and Toasted Walnut Salad
Roasted Beet & Arugula Salad with Walnut Gorgonzola Dressing
Perfect Boiled and Deviled Eggs
The Perfect Omelette
Main Courses
Chopped Thai Chicken Salad
Salmon and Chickpea Salad
Tender Slow-Cooked Pork Ribs
Grilled Flank Steak with Paprika Dry Rub
Grilled Saucy Chicken Wings
Thin Crust Pizza with Homemade Dough and Sauce
Potato Gnocchi
Perfect Ravioli (extra time required)
Desserts
Perfect Pumpkin Pie
Maple Pecan Pie with Bourbon
Pumpkin Cheese Cake
Crème Brûlée
Lemon Soufflés with Chocolate Sauce
Chocolate Soufflés with Blood Orange or Pomegranate Sauce
Flourless Chocolate Cake
Mint Chocolate Swirl Fudge
Lemon Brûlée Pie
Plum Almond Frangipane Tart
5 day Cooking/Woodworking
Combo Course Project
10 day Cooking/Woodworking
Combo Course Project