Experience the art of old-time retro cooking in a 1940s East Asheville log cabin.
You’ll think you’re in granny’s kitchen as you tie on a vintage feed-sack apron and bake up pies, biscuits, our garden veggies, and more using retro kitchen gadgets, mixers, bowls, and a 1928 Home Comfort wood cookstove. Recipes are heirloom, and ingredients are seasonal, local, and organic when possible. All classes hands-on and include recipes and take-home food or in-class feast. Beginning and experienced cooks welcome. Cost includes materials fee. Class size limited to 8.
Vegetarian substitutions available for all classes.
June ... Garden to Table Monday, June 29th 6:00-8:30pm $45
After gathering our evening's veggies from our organic gardens, we'll sip fresh berry sangria while munching on local chevre and herb stuffed fried squash blossoms. Then we'll move on to crispy smashed new potatoes, little Ronde de Nice zucchini and green pattypan squash stuffed with Hickory Nut Gap Farm sausage and garden veggies and home made crunchy sauerkraut. Let's top off the evening with this summer's backyard black raspberry sorbet topped with a last summer's mellowed black raspberry cordial and a lemon cornmeal cookie.
July ... Garden to Table Friday, July 10 6:00-8:30pm $45
Lemon Verbena Mojitos and lime basil pesto topped crostini will accompany us as we gather the evening's dinner fare from the gardens. We'll string old-timey tater patch beans for grandmother Maudie's slow cooked beans topped with heirloom tomato & onion garden salsa, and grill blackberry glazed chicken. Dutch oven baked cornbread with nasturtium butter and fresh garden pickles will join us at the table. (You get to grind the local corn with a hand-cranked grinder.) The feast ends with a lemon cornmeal plum cake topped with a scoop of vibrant purple plum sorbet. Oh, what the heck, let's drizzle on some of last summer's aged plum cordial.
Summer PIE! Tuesday, July 28 6:00-8:30pm $45
What are we, really, if not summer pie bakers? When people ask me, "What's your favorite pie?" I always answer, "Whatever fruit I picked the day I bake my pie!" We'll learn the art of the flaky all-butter pie crust (and folks, we're talking FLAKY, without a bunch of extra butter, either) And let's see, peaches, blackberries, and blueberries will be in full swing, so we'll just make all kinds of fruit pies and tarts with lattice, solid, and crumbly tops. We'll even make some decorative pastry cut-outs to adorn our pies. Class starts with a glass of wine and appetizers from the garden and ends with pie-eating.
Preserving the Harvest Wednesday, August 19
More information to come.
Edible Organic Bath & Beauty Products To be Scheduled
You know how they say “don’t put anything on your skin you wouldn’t eat?” Well, here’s the answer to your dreams … body and bath products made of a variety of organic oils, dried edible flowers, and my neighbor's beeswax. We’ll make vanilla bean infused lip balm, coconut face & body cream, cocoa scented body bar, historic cold cream from 1848, herbal facial steam stuff, rose bath fizzies, and a divine bath tea. I’ve adorned my products with vintage labels & irreverent names and I’ll give hints for labeling your products as well. We’ll have a healthy "spa" lunch mid-way during the class and participants will leave with a sample of each item we make.
Extra packaging materials such as empty lip balm tubes, small glass jars, and tins will be available for purchase during the class. These spa products make terrific gifts!
New!!! The "I don't cook" series of classes for beginning or lapsed cooks.
I hear this all the time, I don't cook, and I can never quite believe it. In fact, I find it shocking! So I'm just going to do what little I can to encourage everyone who wants to, to get in the kitchen and whip out some healthy, easy, seasonal, and mostly relatively quick slow foods that will tickle your innards. Future classes will include I don't make soups and stews, I don't bake, I don't prepare fresh seasonal vegetables, I don't throw dinner parties, the possibilities are endless! We'll also learn knife skills, ingredients, kitchen equipment, seasoning know-how, and what kinds of foods pair well with others.
To Register for classes, call (828) 298-2270 or email: swellcookin@hotmail.com
To receive notice of future classes ... contact us by email at swellcookin@hotmail.com (We never give out your email or address to anyone!)
Gift Certificates Available!!!
Ask us about private group classes for friends, family, or co-workers. We can accommodate from 6 to 15 per group.
Other Cooking Classes in the Asheville Area
I'm just one of many offering cooking classes in the Asheville area, be sure to check out the following terrific classes as well (I know they're terrific because I've taken classes with all these folks):
Swannanoa School of Culinary Arts
this summer right in your own back yard at Warren Wilson College July
13-26
Cooking Classes and more all year at John
C. Campbell Folk School
Slow Food Asheville, monthly
events you won't want to miss, check the events link
Italian Cooking Classes with Wally
Maria Mazzucco Wyatt
Thai Cooking Classes in your home
or hers Kade Espy
Stecoah Valley Cultural
Arts Center in Robbinsville NC
Vegetarian, Vegan, Macrobiotic Cooking
with Lenore Baum
Barbara Swell has written eight historic cookbooks including Log Cabin Cooking, The Lost Art of Pie Making, and The First American Cookie Lady. See Native Ground (click on Kitchen & Home) She teaches cooking classes at the John C. Campbell Folk School, Swannanoa School of Culinary Arts, and elsewhere, and is on the Slow Food Asheville Board. An overenthusiastic organic gardener, you'll most often find her rooting in the dirt.
Barbara Swell
Directions: Log Cabin Cooking & Music is located at 111 Bell Road, just off off New Haw Creek Road in the Haw Creek section of East Asheville. From Highway 240 in Asheville, take exit #7. From 240 going East, turn left at the light. From 240 going West, turn right at the light. Now you're on Tunnel Road going east. At the very first light, turn left and then take a sudden right on New Haw Creek Road. Go about 1 ½ miles. On your right you’ll see a baseball field. Turn right at the beginning of the ball field on Bell Road. Pass Evergreen Charter School on your left. You’ll see a new development on your right, (Ozark Springs Road) and then our big garden on the right. At the end of the garden, you’ll see two big black mailboxes that say 111 and 109. Turn right there. As you come up the driveway, the cabin will be on your left. You can park either in front of in back of the cabin.
For more information, call (828) 298-2270 or (828) 299-7031
email:
swellcookin@hotmail.com
Log Cabin Cooking & Music
111 Bell Road
Asheville NC 28805
Office: (828) 299-7031
Fax: (828) 298-5607
