Mountain Chefs course!

 In August my friend Ginny and I decided that it would be fun to go on a Mountain Chefs cookery course in the French Alps, where we learnt how to be Chalet girls! We stayed in a chalet for a week with 3 other people and were taught by a chef how to cook a weeks worth of meals for a family that you would cater for if you were a chalet host. 

Below Ginny and I are up in the mountains above our chalet on hay bales!

These are Goats cheese, leek and mushroom 'Pithiviers' which are puff pastry parcles. They were really easy to make and very tasty. We had them for lunch with a little rocket salad on the side! 

To make, you just cut out 2 puff pastry circles and place your filling inside, clamp the edges shut, egg wash them and then bake in the oven!

Our finished 'Pithivier' with rocket salad and balsamic drizzle.

Here I am up in the French Alps- such beautiful weather and scenery! 

We also learnt the more unpalatable side to cooking, where we had to fillet a chicken in to 2 breasts and 2 leg pieces! Here I am filleting my chicken!

With the chicken I filleted, we made Chicken breast with sweet potato puree on a bed of courgette ribbons and a chicken jus. This was one of my favourite meals that we made during the week! But soooo much butter went in to the puree, nearly a whole packet- eek!

We also made a lovely mushroom risotto for lunch with a rocket garnish on top

This was by far my favourite thing we made, it was a starter but delicious! It is a confit chicken ballotine, wrapped in Palma ham with apricot chutney! Yum! 

This was another starter we made, of smoked salmon roulade with avocado puree and a cumin crisp!

These brownies we made were de-licious! We also made the lemon thyme ice cream to go on top and the chocolate decorations!

On our last night of cooking we made some canapes from the left over food we made, these are them!

We also made Arancini balls, which is risotto rolled in breadcrumbs and deep fried- amazing!

Our last starter was a goats cheese tart with a balsamic vinegar glaze!

We had one free day before we went home from the French Alps, so Ginny and I indulged in a Raclette- Melted mountain cheese which you smear on to vegetables and french bread!

So all in all it was a pretty fattening week, but it was worth it and I had a lovely time with cooking with Ginny (here she is below tucking in to our raclette!)