Culinary School- Mexican Food

David and I had the opportunity the other night to go to a Culinary School in Sacramento and try our hand at Mexican food.  I had bought the tickets for the class on Groupon a few months ago.  Traffic was horrible even though it was a Thursday night so we were running a little late. Luckily for us quite a few other people were running late, because of traffic, so they gave us each a glass of wine while we waited.  It was a red wine, which I usually don't go for, but it was delicious!  The class was held at a cute Culinary Academy that is also open for lunch and dinner a few days a week.  There was little twinkling lights hung from the ceiling and the restaurant was decorated in a Old World European style. 

The head chef set up his cooking center in the center of the U shaped tables and then demonstrated how to make the three dishes for the night.  He was a very entertaining gentleman with a heavy accent!  His accent got more pronounced the more he drank his wine.  So there was a few times we were like what? What did he say?  He would then walk around with his pan or blender or whatever he was working on so that we could see what he was talking about.

There were 32 people in the class that night so we were divided into 3 separate teams.  Each team was going to make the food for the 8 people in their group.  The menu for the night was Chicken Tortilla Soup, Chili Rellenos and Flan.  David and I took the lead on the chicken tortilla soup.  They had most of the ingredients cut up for you in advance so that was a real time saver.  

When the tortilla soup was mixed up we put it on the stove to heat up and then I started in on the Chile Rellenos.  David had made them years ago when he worked at a Mexican Restaurant while in High School but these were made the true Mexican way we were told!  We fire roasted the chilies then wrapped them in Saran Wrap to sweat.  That made pulling off the skin really easy.  We then de-seeded them and cut out some of the ribs of the chili peppers.  That was suppose to take most of the heat away from the dish.  We then stuffed them with cheese and dredged them in flour.  We then dipped them into beaten eggs and dropped them into a hot pan filled with oil.  They browned on each side and then we plated them and added a little tomato sauce and sour cream.  We also made rice and beans to go with the dish.

By the time we were done with the Chili Rellenos we realized that someone else from our team had made all of the flan while we were making the soup.  So we really didn't get to even see them make it.  David and I both have made Flan before but never in a 8 inch round cake pan.  We have always made single serve size Flan.  I feel pretty confident that we could make this by ourselves even though we didn't get to see it being done that night.

The staff let us go back to our seats and have another drink while they plated each groups food. They brought out our Chicken Tortilla Soup first but it was so delicious I didn't take a picture of it before I ate it! Our soup was voted the best soup of the night so we were happy about that.  Right at the last minute I asked if I could have another couple pieces of the cheese that we stuffed the Chili Rellenos with.  I added that to our soup and I think the salty cheese added the little something extra that placed our soup in first place. Our plate was then served to us and it looked great and tasted wonderful!  My Chili Relleno was a little too spicy for me but I managed to eat quite a lot of it.  David had no problem whatsoever finishing off my plate!

We were served the Flan after we had finished our dinner.  I was so full that I could only taste a bite of the Flan.  It was good but I personally like the kind that David and I make at home better.  This Flan was a little bit more firm and custard like.  I like the creamy kind that we do better.  Plus we had more brown sugar and butter on ours and that makes a really nice caramel sauce over the top.

So I would say that the Culinary School was a great Date Night for us!  We had a lot of fun getting out and trying a few different dishes.  We had fun talking and getting to know a few of the other couples that were there that night.  We will definitely be coming back and maybe trying another countries food.  I think we are either going to do the Italian or the Persian food next.  Bon Appetite!