Cooks Academy provides cookery lessons in a relaxed environment for people who love cooking or just food! Bursting with talent and flavour, we put together superb Cookery Programmes, combining guest and celebrity chefs together with an exciting fusion of classes.

Sit back, relax in our state of the art Siemens Kitchen and join our team of professional cookery tutors. We'll be showing you how to create sumptuous meals including plenty of do ahead tips for entertaining.

You can choose from six week evening courses, a one off demo or hands on class to inspire you or go all the way with our Professional Certificate Course.

Founded in May 2005 by Vanessa and Tim Greenwood, the unique mix of elegant and purposely fitted out premises together with a relaxed, fun and educational environment has ensured the school's success and excellent reputation to date.

What the Customers say . . .

'Many thanks for the wonderful Sushi Cookery Class which I attended last Saturday. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and learnt plenty of new tips for future dinner parties. I will be recommending your wonderful cookery academy to all my friends.'
Sushi Workshop Participant

'I attended the first of the Green Living classes last night and it was incredible. Really, really enjoyed it and lots of food for thought as well as the tasty dishes.'
Green Living Participant

'Really appreciated the effort both yourself and Vanessa put into our day yesterday. A great time had by all and a really useful couple of hours which hopefully will inspire us all to be better cooks! I'll tell all what a great experience Cooks Academy was for us. Continued success for your business'
Corporate Teambuilding Client

What the Papers say . . .

'BOOK THESE COOKS. Focaccia, pea risotto, spaghetti with salsa verde ice-cream; strawberry mascarpone tartlets and barista-standard cappuccinos and lattes - is it possible to make all this in just two and a half hours?'
Irish Times Saturday

'A CLASS ACT. Both budding chefs and those who just like to watch can get their cooking kicks at Cooks Academy, the slick new cooking school in Dun Laoghaire.'
Food and Wine

'MEAL THAT'S A WALK IN THE PARK. if you think it is impossible to cook a three course dinner for two in just 30 minutes, Vanessa Greenwood is just the woman to prove you wrong.'
Irish Independent

'COOKS ACADEMY FILLS THE VOID. Cooking is a skill best learned by practice, so the earlier you start the better. The home is the perfect place for children to learn with a parent how to stir the right amount of milk into a white sauce or to watch brown in the oven.'
Sunday Business Post

COURSES

Quick Entertaining (Intermediate) Evenings

Tutor: Jenny Record

Entertaining friends and / or family at home? We’ll show you how to prepare simple, stylish and sophisticated food to tease their taste buds and thrill their palate. With lots of great tips and techniques to prompt and sustain your culinary renaissance, we’ll take you round the world in eighty ways with our recipes. From classic French cuisine and always fashionable Italian to road shack Thai and traditional Irish. Join us on this epicurean adventure and enjoy sharing the spoils.

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Bread Making

Tutor: Grainne Wall

Manna from heaven? Well, not quite but bread really is a blessing, come to our class and learn to knead, knock, pummel and stretch your way to domestic bliss. Fill your house with the glorious smell of freshly baked bread. From savoury focaccia and nutritious brown to sweet fruit scones and gingerbread. We'll help you deal with dough and introduce you to the sensory and rewarding experience of bread making.

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Perfect Pastries & Desserts

Tutor: Margaret Heskin

‘Sweets for your sweet and sugar for your honey’ Or just fancy whipping up some dreamy desserts, angel-light pastries and luscious puddings? Book yourself on to our Perfect Pastries and Desserts hands on class and we’ll show you how to make a little indulgence go a long way.

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Truly Italian - Sunshine Food

Tutor: Ursula Ferrigno

Join livewire, celebrity Italian chef and food writer, Ursula Ferrigno, who returns to Cooks Academy, for the first of two back to back demonstrations this Friday in June. Ursula will demonstrate inspiring Italian summer dishes, her sunshine food that you can re-create at home. An accomplished author, Ursula has written several cook books including the enormously successful 'Truly Italian', 'Real Fast Vegetarian Food', 'The Bread Book' and her latest 'La Dolce Vita', all of which have met with critical acclaim. She believes passionatlely in home cooking and brings the spirit of Italy into every kitchen. Ursula teaches in London, Italy and in her own cookery school - Taste Italia - in Essex. She is a fountain of food knowledge while her infectious enthusiasm and joie de vivre will rub off on you for sure!

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Yummy Parties

Tutor: Aoileann Garavaglia

Cookery Workshop for Kids (11 to 16 years). Your child can join RTE's YUMee presenter, Aoileann Garavaglia for a week long fun filled cookery workshop. These workshops encourage children to learn about food in a fun and exciting way, with a huge emphasis on kitchen safety. Having had a life long love affair with food Aoileann brings inventiveness, enthusiasm, knowledge and skill to these workshops and her cooking style is infectious! Get your child interested in the life skill of cooking healthy and nutritious food from an early age. Lunch is also included.

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Essential Seafood Course

Tutor: Grainne Wall

Starting with the basics you'll learn how to recognise, buy, prepare and cook just about every type of fish. During our four week Essential Seafood Course you will learn how to deal with flatfish, whitefish, oily fish and shellfish. And after the four weeks you'll be a dab hand at chowders, fish stocks, sauces for fish and a multitude of healthy fish dishes. So learn this valuable life skill of cooking fish - it will be with you forever.

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Basic Cookery Course

Tutor: Grainne Wall

Join Cooks Academy for this confidence building class. Learn how to cook simple recipes and build up your basic skills. You’ll be whipping up your own desserts, soups, casseroles and even bread with minimal fuss. We’ll teach you all the basics starting with easy main dishes that are real favourites. Educating you as to which ingredients to stock at home while inspiring you to cook up something nice each time your enthusiasm grips you.

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Confident Barbecues

Tutor: Grainne Wall

Get ready for summer with Cooks Academy's Confident Barbecues demonstration. We'll be showing you all the tips to ensure you become an expert barbecuer, not to mention great marinades, salads and sides. The class is divided between the demonstration indoors and the real barbecuing outside in the Cooks Academy garden. To top it off you'll dine on this mouthwatering feast.

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Vegetarian & Wholefood Cookery

Tutor: Rozanne Stevens

Perhaps you could do with some innovative vegetarian recipes where the emphaisis is on fresh colourful dishes and not just beans and lentils? Help rejuvenate your repertoire. Whatever your motive, join Rozanne Stevens for an evening of delightful cooking and expert nutritional advice that will inspire you to cook vegetarian masterpieces, everyone will love.

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Introduction to Thai French Cookery

Tutor: Grainne Wall

Thai-French cuisine is one of the modern world's great examples of fusion food. It combines classical french cookery with the ingredients of Thai cuisine. In effect its a lighter style of French cookery with a real zing! Join our expert chef Grainne Wall for this stunning evening of innovative 21st century fusion food.

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Introduction to Vietnamese Cookery

Tutor: Rozanne Stevens

Vietnamese food is fast emerging as one of the most popular of all Asian cuisines. Its emphasis on fresh herbs, raw vegetables and light seasonings makes it ideal for the health-conscious cook. Information on Vietnamese ingredients and cooking techniques ensures this class is perfect for anyone interested in the cuisine of this vibrant and beautiful country, where food is a daily celebration of life.

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Introduction to Indian Cookery

Tutor: Margaret Heskin

Don't be fooled by cheap imitations! Learn the real thing at Cooks Academy and join our expert tutor Margaret Heskin for this culinary journey through India where she will introduce you to some super Indian dishes you can re-create in your own home.

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Introduction to Thai Cookery

Tutor: Ruth Wassel

For those of you who loved our first Thai class this is the perfect sequel. If you haven't been to Thai 1, don't worry - you don't need to do these in any particular order. Our guest chef Ruth Wassel will be unlocking the secrets of fresh Thai cookery that we've all come to love and admire so that you can create some stunning tastes of South East Asia in your own home.

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Green Living - Nutrition & Wholefood Cookery

Tutor: Rozanne Stevens

Take six Monday evenings out to attend our extremely popular nutrition focused cookery course. Green Living's emphasis is on a wholefood and plant based diet. The course is divided into six sessions and each one covers an aspect of a healthy living food diet that participants can incorporate into their lifestyle to whatever degree suits them. The course teaches you how to make sustainable changes to your life without losing the enjoyment and sensual pleasure of food. It makes nutritional theory tangible and is very informative yet fun. Green Living is delivered by Rozanne Stevens, Naturopathic Iridologist and wholefood expert. One of our happy participants had this to say about the Week 1 lesson: 'I attended the first of the Green Living classes last night and it was incredible. Really really enjoyed it and lots of food for thought as well as the tasty dishes'.

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The Wine & Food of Napa Valley

Tutor: Liam Campbell

Ever wanted to cook some great recipes and learn how to match stunning wines with them? Join our guest Liam Campbell who is a member of the Irish Guild of Sommeliers and a Cooks Academy chef for our sophisticated 4 week wine and food matching course based on the wine of Napa Valley and the food of California. During the class you'll sample some of the wonderful food and wine of this land.

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PROFESSIONAL COURSES

Full Time Professional Certificate Course

Designed for those who wish to fast track their professional culinary expertise for their career or just for pleasure, the new course features twenty days of practical cooking, demonstrations and lectures.

This certificate course is perfect for aspiring food entrepreneurs, people looking to work in the catering and hospitality sectors, 'foodies' or indeed anyone needing to upskill quickly so as to enable them to cook and cater with confidence.

Some of the things students learn include making stocks, sauces, the art of pastry making and baking, butchery, fishmongery, knife skills, as well as learning about herbs, spices, and speciality produce and not forgetting kitchen management to include menu planning, larder management, storage, stock rotation and much, much more . . .

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BEGINNERS COOKERY COURSE

Beginners Cookery

Tutor: Grainne Wall

The eight week beginner's cookery course is a practical (hands-on) class and is perfect if you only have a little cookery knowledge or not much at all. The course covers traditional and contemporary cooking with a concise curriculum containing everything from soups, stocks & sauces to meat, poultry and fish, Baking, Pastries and Desserts.

Special emphasis is placed throughout the course on cooking methods and techinques with other useful tips on subjects such as knife skills. At each session you will prepare and cook your own dishes and dine on the meal afterwards or take your creations home to impress your family. Beginner's Cookery is perfect if you want to start from scratch, learn the fundamenatls and become a confident cook . . . a life skill you will always have with you.

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GROUP COURSES

CORPORATE AND SOCIAL GROUPS

Cookery Workshops & Demonstrations are a superb activity for groups of people from a corporate or social background to relax and learn: to unwind and to unlock creativity.

Whether it is teambuilding or a company night out, find out about the range of products below:

Cookery Team-Building

Cookery Team-Building Workshops at Cooks Academy are designed to build awareness of the importance of teams in developing organizational services and solutions while generating skills and attitudes that encourage team success.

The Workshops are purpose built for managers and staff who are involved in project teams, functional teams and service delivery teams and are ideally suited to a group of 4 - 12 from your company.

Each workshop combines a theoretical aspect together with a hands on cooking dimension. They are conducted jointly by a Cooks Academy Cookery Tutor and a member of our panel of professional corporate trainers.

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Work, Life Balance Cookery Courses

Good diet and cooking are often the first things to lose out in our busy lives.

Balancing our professional and social lives is becoming increasingly trickier in this busy 21st century world. Good food and nutrition, we all know, are essential to keep energy levels up and to ward off illness. Indeed the ability to cook and knowledge of food are valuable social and life skills.

The recent growth of so many new organic, wholefood and exotic ingredients together with exciting worldwide cuisines touching our shores, contribute to the current general interest in cooking

As part of the development, nurturing, training and team building of your people why not send them on a bespoke Cookery Course. They can choose from Basic, Entertaining, Wholefood, Ethnic, Seafood or even Wine and Food Matching. In fact we can tailor just about any cookery course to your requirement. Courses take place one evening a week for four or six weeks, depending on content.

Cookery lessons are not age or gender specific in any way and people enjoy interacting with and getting to know colleagues from different departments on a level other than work.

So get the Work, Life Balance culture right in your organisation and start with one of our great Cookery Courses here at Cooks Academy.

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Corporate Cookery Evenings

We're all looking for new ideas for our company nights out. If you are tired of Go-Karting, Bowling or just another dinner in a restaurant with too many people around a table, why not check out Cooks Academy's take on the company night out.

Our corporate cookery evenings are demonstration based and run from 6:30pm to 9:00pm on weekday evenings.

The price is €50 per person which includes a gourmet four course evening meal and wine. We need a minimum of 20 people and maximum numbers are 30 people.
Here are just some of the titles your group can choose from:

• Journey through Thailand
• Dusky Moroccan Promise
• Parisian Bistro Romance
• Quick Entertaining
• Wholefood Cookery for Health
• Seafood Classics

All our participants are supplied with a recipe booklet to take away so that they can recreate these inspirational dishes at home.

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Cooking Parties

Whether you're planning a birthday surprise, a school reunion, an office/team activity or even a hen party; whatever the occasion Cooking Parties at Cooks Academy are a perfect alternative day or evening out.

What better activity than to roll up your sleeves and under the watchful eye of our expert tutors, learn how to cook wonderful dishes the professional way?

All cooking parties are practical ('hands on') and last for a half day session which is 3 hours. You can choose a morning, afternoon or evening session, although morning is generally best because everyone is fresher. Typical participant numbers are 6 - 12 people but we can be flexible on this.

Your group can choose, in consultation, with Cooks Academy what you'd like to learn to cook on the day. Here's a taste of some of the worldwide cuisine other groups have cooked:

• Italian
• French
• Sushi
• Thai
• Tapas
• Moroccan
• Seafood
• Quick Entertaining
• Vegetarian & Wholefood
• Breads
• Pastries & Desserts

Participants dine on the feasts they prepare and are supplied with a recipe booklet to take away so that they can recreate these inspirational dishes at home.

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THE TEAM

	Vanessa Greenwood Vanessa Greenwood is the co-founder of Cooks Academy. Her love of cooking inspired her to open the school and share her knowledge of food and its preparation with others. Her real passion is teaching, and her success has been founded on the ability to instil confidence, enthusiasm and a sense of fun in all her students, along with an in-depth knowledge of good food. The youngest of five children, Vanessa was drawn to cooking at an early age. Her Welsh grandmother taught her the basics of cooking and she developed her expertise by travelling extensively to educate her palate on many of the world's finest cuisines. Over the years Vanessa has professionally trained at the Culinary Institute of America and attended numerous cookery courses in Ireland, UK and further afield. Graduating with a Masters in Business Studies from the Michael Smurfit Graduate School of Business, Vanessa went on to pursue a business career in Executive Education and IT. A career change to catering some years ago took her back to her lifelong passion of food. And now in addition to the non stop work of managing and developing Cooks Academy she writes the monthly Food Notes column for Image Magazine. She has also appeared as a guest chef on TVAM, The Health Squad and RTE's Winter Food radio programme.
	Jenny Record Jenny Record brings a wealth of experience to Cooks Academy. For the past 12 years she has been teaching the Diploma Cookery Course at Leiths School of Food and Wine which is one of the top Cookery Schools in London. For many years she has also run her own catering business in Chelsea. There is little Jenny doesn't know about Food, Cooking and Entertaining so we are naturally delighted that she is teaching at Cooks Academy and sharing her wealth of knowledge with Cooks Academy's students while continuing with her work at Leiths.
	Gráinne Wall Gráinne is a chef of impressive pedigree - Her skills have graced the tables of some of London's finest restaurants including Vongs at the Berkelely Hotel in Knightsbridge and Quaglinos at Green Park. In addition to her illustrious career in London, Gráinne has worked as sous chef at Avoca Café in Dublin city for four years. She has many food influences and has above all a versatile style - from modern haute cuisine dining of London's finest to the wholesome modern cafe food of Avoca to the casual, throw it together style of Jamie Oliver.
	Ruth Wassel Ruth has lived in Naples, Italy for 10 years where she ran her own catering business called International Flavours. She then worked for two years, teaching at Ballymaloe Cookery School in Cork. Ruth's teaching expertise is currently put to huge effect with Houseworks, one of Ireland's leading kitchen design companies. Apart from Ruth's obvious Italian and Mediterranean influences, she has a fabulous talent with international cuisine from diverse cultures and that is why you will see her taking many of Cooks Academy's ethnic lessons such as Thai to Mexican.
	Rozanne Stevens Born and bred in South Africa, Rozanne moved to Ireland in 1999. Prior to that she had developed an impressive array of food and wine knowledge. At age 20 she became a Food and Wine Lecturer for The Cape Wine Academy which is one of the few accredited wine academies world wide. In 2003 she became a Naturopathic Iridologist and is a member of The European Guild of Naturopathic Iridologists. She now runs Green Living Health and Lifestyle Clinic. As an Iridologist, she examines the iris to asses strengths and weaknesses in different tissues and organs of the body. Based on that she makes dietary recommendations and lifestyle changes. She has also had the privilege of studying further under Frank Navratil, a famous Naturopath and Brian Clement the Director of the world-renowned Hipprocrates Healing Centre. Her nutritional background is raw-food veganism but her background in food and wine makes it less puritannical. She aims to incorporate healthy additions and habits into peoples' lives to crowd out the bad. This replaces negative choices with positive ones as people start to value and appreciate better health and quality of life. Rozanne incorporates food combining, juicing, sprouting, good carbohydrate choices, and organic produce as some of the changes people can make to their lives.
	Tim Greenwood Co-founder of Cooks Academy, Tim grew up by the sea in Wicklow. Being the son of a Fisherman, Tim was brought up eating the 'Catch of the Day'. A daily diet of Turbot, Plaice and Dublin Bay Prawns has instilled in him a love of the sea and especially eating and preparing seafood simply. His inspiration to found Cooks Academy comes from a desire to provide a unique Dublin Cookery School whose raison d'etre is the spread of cookery education for all. Tim has a strong professional background in sales and marketing through diverse industry sectors. An honours graduate of History at UCD, he also holds a Higher Diploma in Business Studies from The Michael Smurfit Graduate School of Business, UCD. He handles the Sales, Marketing and Financial running of Cooks Academy as well as being chief recipe guinea pig!
	Margaret Heskin Margaret Heskin is a Cordon Bleu and Ballymaloe trained Chef as well as a passionate foodie with a wide variety of interest in all things food related. Margaret has worked in the food industry all her adult life and is a dynamic and committed tutor. Margaret spent five years working in The Ballymaloe Cookery School where she taught and also worked many successful cookery books and was assistant producer on the eight part RTE television series Bread at Ballymaloe. She has now returned to the Pale and lives in Co Meath with her fiance, Robert and their two dogs.
	Aoileann Garavaglia Aoileann is best known for her Children's Cookery Books Yumee and Its a Yummee World. She has been delighting children of all ages for years now through her Yummy Parties and has presented the children's cookery programme on RTE's Den TV. She always encourages children to learn about food in a fun and exciting way, with a huge emphasis on kitchen safety. Having had a life long love affair with food she brings inventiveness, enthusiasm, knowledge and skill to her parties and workshops. During the Summer holidays Aoileann runs fun filled Cookery Workshops for kids here at Cooks Academy. Aoileann is not just an expert children's cookery teacher. Her Irish Italian upbringing together with her sense of fun brings a wealth of knowledge, expertise and dynamism to Cookery Lessons for all ages.
	Oliver McCabe Oliver has been running the award winning health food store 'Select Stores' in Dalkey since 2004. His love for nutrition started on his travels to Australia and the USA where he worked in various organic, vegetarian cafes and stores picking up ideas along the way especially in Sydney and San Francisco. He even worked with Australia's top celebrity chef Neil Perry for a while. In 2004, Oliver reinvented Select Stores from traditional family greengrocer to dynamic health food store with organic juice bar, cafe and much more. He is currently studying to become a nutritional therapist with Irelands finest, Richard Burton. Oliver also gives healthy eating talks and demos in local primary and secondary schools. He organised the 'Dalkey Health Expo' in 2005 and has gone on to give detox juicing demos at the National Health Show in the RDS in October 2005. He graduated in TV production / communications with honours from Dun Laoghaire Institute of Technology in 1998.

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