I'm thinking about trying to start teaching basic intro cooking classes. (I'm trying to think through whether it would work, and if there might be interest. I'd love your feedback in this beginning stage of the thinking it through process).
The idea is I would be teaching an affordable basics cooking class. It would be things like reading a recipe, making salad dressings, and such. I'd be particularly looking to teaching moms (and dads), and college students. the idea would be to focus on ways to improve your diet and health while saving money, that can be done pretty quick, realizing that parents (working or sah) and students don't have much extra time.
It would be aimed at helping people who don't cook at all, whose idea of homemade is hamburger helper or eat out most of the time or eat a lot of frozen/processed/canned food, but know that they could feed their families (and selves) better and for less if they learn to cook. I couldn't cover everything of course. I'd try to cover some basics which will save a lot of money and improve health greatly and which are pretty easy, and things that will give them the skills to try to cook other things.
I'm thinking I would cover:
skills:
basic knife skills
understanding recipes
we'd also talk about choosing ingrediants (and products that are much better for processed food
foods:
salad dressings (vinegrettes and creamy ones)
a couple egg dishes: scrambled eggs(or does everyone know how to cook this?), eggs in a nest (of greens), migas,
roast chicken (and recipes to stretch the meat a while)
veggies- a variety of veggies and some of the best ways to prepare them so they're truely tasty. so many people don't know how to cook veggies to their best advantage
maybe beans but I feel like canned beans are fairly decent, and so it's not.. a "hot spot" in the sense of one thing that makes a big difference cost or health wise (ok, cost wise a pretty big difference, but not as much as some other things, I think.)
snacks (maybe we'd just talk about this one.)
I was thinking either small groups in people's homes (or churches etc)(probably offering a discount for the person whose home it is. unfortunately my home is much too small or else I'd do it here. I may be moving and if I end up with a large enough kitchen, I'd do it here, but that's really unlikely) or I have a couple of ideas of other places that might work (a couple commercial kitchens I might be able to rent, or run a class through). If I did homes, I'd probably offer to either give one person a discount for hosting their home for a group of whomever wanted to take the class (we'd agree on how many, probably 4-5 people), or a group who knew each other could take the class together and help find the place(house, church, community center, etc)
Also, in format, I was thinking an hour or an hour and a half of cooking (maybe with 15 minutes/half hour talking intro to the day), and 30 minutes or so of eating the food, and talking, either just socializing, or talking about specific food issues/things they want to know/change/want advice about.
Is this something you might be interested in (or would have been interested in when you first learned to cook)?
How much would/could you pay for it? (either per class/per 4 or 6 class series) (this is a big possible concern with this idea. could people afford/would they be willing to pay enough to cover food supplies, overhead (admittedly minimal, but maybe rent, maybe not), and for me to earn enough to make it my while. I don't think I'd do this full time, but in addition to the time spent in class, there's also the time spent shopping, and planning.)
Are there other things you would want to be covered? Things I mentioned you wouldn't be interested in?
Is 1.5-2 hours too long a class? ( I mean, I know it's not too long for attention span. Is it an unreasonably long stretch for parents to get childcare/the other parent to care for the kids? It would probably be in the evenings.)
Any other feedback? Thank you so much for helping me think this idea through.
The idea is I would be teaching an affordable basics cooking class. It would be things like reading a recipe, making salad dressings, and such. I'd be particularly looking to teaching moms (and dads), and college students. the idea would be to focus on ways to improve your diet and health while saving money, that can be done pretty quick, realizing that parents (working or sah) and students don't have much extra time.
It would be aimed at helping people who don't cook at all, whose idea of homemade is hamburger helper or eat out most of the time or eat a lot of frozen/processed/canned food, but know that they could feed their families (and selves) better and for less if they learn to cook. I couldn't cover everything of course. I'd try to cover some basics which will save a lot of money and improve health greatly and which are pretty easy, and things that will give them the skills to try to cook other things.
I'm thinking I would cover:
skills:
basic knife skills
understanding recipes
we'd also talk about choosing ingrediants (and products that are much better for processed food
foods:
salad dressings (vinegrettes and creamy ones)
a couple egg dishes: scrambled eggs(or does everyone know how to cook this?), eggs in a nest (of greens), migas,
roast chicken (and recipes to stretch the meat a while)
veggies- a variety of veggies and some of the best ways to prepare them so they're truely tasty. so many people don't know how to cook veggies to their best advantage
maybe beans but I feel like canned beans are fairly decent, and so it's not.. a "hot spot" in the sense of one thing that makes a big difference cost or health wise (ok, cost wise a pretty big difference, but not as much as some other things, I think.)
snacks (maybe we'd just talk about this one.)
I was thinking either small groups in people's homes (or churches etc)(probably offering a discount for the person whose home it is. unfortunately my home is much too small or else I'd do it here. I may be moving and if I end up with a large enough kitchen, I'd do it here, but that's really unlikely) or I have a couple of ideas of other places that might work (a couple commercial kitchens I might be able to rent, or run a class through). If I did homes, I'd probably offer to either give one person a discount for hosting their home for a group of whomever wanted to take the class (we'd agree on how many, probably 4-5 people), or a group who knew each other could take the class together and help find the place(house, church, community center, etc)
Also, in format, I was thinking an hour or an hour and a half of cooking (maybe with 15 minutes/half hour talking intro to the day), and 30 minutes or so of eating the food, and talking, either just socializing, or talking about specific food issues/things they want to know/change/want advice about.
Is this something you might be interested in (or would have been interested in when you first learned to cook)?
How much would/could you pay for it? (either per class/per 4 or 6 class series) (this is a big possible concern with this idea. could people afford/would they be willing to pay enough to cover food supplies, overhead (admittedly minimal, but maybe rent, maybe not), and for me to earn enough to make it my while. I don't think I'd do this full time, but in addition to the time spent in class, there's also the time spent shopping, and planning.)
Are there other things you would want to be covered? Things I mentioned you wouldn't be interested in?
Is 1.5-2 hours too long a class? ( I mean, I know it's not too long for attention span. Is it an unreasonably long stretch for parents to get childcare/the other parent to care for the kids? It would probably be in the evenings.)
Any other feedback? Thank you so much for helping me think this idea through.
