Cooking with the pros

Ahh the Cordon Bleu -- the storied alma mater of Julia Child, Mario Batali, and Audrey Hepburn's Sabrina -- who knew I'd get a taste of your greatness? It turns out the Cordon Bleu in Paris offers many cooking demonstration classes for the general public, and I was lucky enough to be part of one. Our chef Marc Thivet, pictured above, was the cutest, most quintessentially French chef ever. He called his sous-chefs mes enfants or "kids." And they were so obedient. For our class we made cappuccino de carrottes au cumin et croustillant de canard confit avec confiture de roscoff et pruneaux -- a carrot puree with whipped cream, and a duck confit in a roscoff onion and prune concotion, wrapped in a thin crispy shell, nestled in a port wine reduction sauce, over a lamb's lettuce salad with apples, mushrooms, truffles and a lemon vinaigrette. That was a lot of information. But it was SO good and unfortunate that we only got to taste a small amount, since there were so many people in the class and there was no way our chef was cooking full portions for everyone. But delicious nonetheless!