Cooking schools to offer new twists and old favorites

You might call it a new taste of the old.

Holly Glenn, events coordinator for Freedom Newspapers of New Mexico, said a cooking school the news group will co-sponsor in October will focus on fast, easy and original ways to prepare dishes that appeal to those who love good, home-cooked, comfort food.

The “Taste of Home” cooking school will be held at 6:30 p.m. on Oct. 23 in Clovis’ Marshall Junior High School auditorium. Tickets are $7 a person and are available in advance at the Clovis News-Journal and the Portales News-Tribune. Any leftover tickets will be for sale at the door, but supply is limited to 1,000, Glenn said.

Offered in conjunction with Taste of Home magazine, one of the best-selling recipe magazines in the country, with 6 million subscribers nationwide, the cooking school will feature 12 different recipes prepared on stage in three different segments — with audience members invited to sample the results, Glenn said.

Recipes typically include such fare as “Classic Lemon Meringue Pie,” “Southwest Sausage Crepes,” “Louisiana Fish Creole” and “Ultimate Chicken Quesadillas,” she said.

The dishes are prepared using name-brand ingredients from sponsors that include Campbell’s soups, Crisco shortening, Franco-American and Hunt’s foods. The audience learns how to use the familiar products in perhaps surprising ways, Glenn said.

“They might learn how to use Jimmy Dean sausage in a crepe, for example,” she said.

Margaret McCutcheon, a home economist from Taste of Home, will give busy cooks a refresher course on such basic techniques as mincing, fluting and caramelizing, and give them a run-down on the basic kitchen equipment they need to survive a “tour of kitchen duty.”

McCutcheon even will train those attending the evening’s cooking school in the fine art of making a meringue, Glenn said.

The presentation will be moderated by Sheryl Borden, host of KENW-TV’s “Creative Living,” Glenn said.

Door prizes will be awarded and audience members will leave the presentation with a Taste of Home cookbook featuring 175 recipes, as well as coupons for a variety of products, she said.

Other sponsors include Albertsons, Bank of Clovis, Towne Crier, Pizza Hut, Cotton Patch, McDaniels Furniture and Plains Regional Medical Center.