Since we’re located in Boulder we’ve finally taken it upon ourselves to think outside of the box (or rather, off-piste) and offer a backcountry meal planning workshop called Hut Cuisine. We’re bringing in seasoned hut enthusiast and chef instructor, Kate Wilson, along with our friends from Alpine Sports to talk about preparing and cooking fun backcountry meals that will make your hut mates envious. We’ll talk skis, backpacks, packing, menus, food, and snacks and then get hands-on and practice a menu here in the kitchen at CSR and all eat together (while enjoying a glass of wine). This class makes a great Valentine’s Day gift for your favorite pinhead – so register today because this is one ‘hot’ class.

Culinary Skills, is our most advanced, 20-week Home Cook course designed to be the ‘best of’ CSR’s professional Chef Track curriculum. The past twelve weeks students have learned techniques, flavor components, and orchestration of meals with their Skills instructor, Chef Shan Siebert. The Skills class is made up of twelve students with a sincere passion for food – who love learning and being introduced to new cooking ideas without the pressure of tests and practicals.

Week 13 had an Italian theme with students cooking up their own pasta, Bolognese sauce, grilled Caeser salad and more. “This is a fun class! Our dishes are awesome.” Everyone gathered around the table designated to pasta-making and floured their hands to roll out and cut pasta dough. Some of the students claimed that what was produced was just like the artisan handmade pasta you buy from specialty shops. “We infused the pasta with flavors like cracked black pepper and spinach-garlic, and tried dessert pasta (chocolate-cinnamon),” said current skills student, Ben Madden. So much for New Years’ resolutions because the class uses lots of butter (=flavor!). Students experiment with slightly healthier versions of the recipes at home, but when they meet for their weekly Skills class, they throw all resolutions to the wind . . . and it’s worth it.

(more…)

It got a little crazy at CSR over the holidays and the top cookie blog had to be put on the back burner. We successfully completed 6 weeks of top cookie with the last two cookies being Spicy Molasses and Chocolate Thin Mint Cookies. Below are recipes and tips for the cookies.

It was great to meet all the people that stopped by to sample all of our tasty cookies. We want to give a big shout to our number one Top Cookie fan Meghan. She stopped by every week and sampled a cookie and took one home to her boyfriend. We looked forward to her weekly visit and were especially excited when she brought us banana bread, and on our finally Top Cookie day she brought along her boyfriend! We also want to give a big shout out to our top cookie baker Sarah Blecher! Thank you for making all the delicious cookies!

Stay tuned to learn more about our upcoming spring sampling.

Read on for recipes!

(more…)