We live in a society that is rushed off it’s feet about 150% of the time – we don’t have the luxury of having loads of time to cook a delicious dinner every night or wash up hundreds of pans after cooking, and we love anything that makes our lives easier and that happens quickly.
Look at the success of Jamie Oliver’s 15 minute meals – a very simple idea of essentially presenting Joe Public with dishes they can make in the shortest possible time with the least washing up….and it has become a best selling book success and a huge TV series. It is now a well known fact that we all love “quick and easy”.
When I got an email from Tefal inviting me to be involved in two 30 minute cooking lessons at L’Atelier Des Chefs in London, I had no idea how much we would achieve in such a short amount of time – 30 minutes isn’t really that long – or how amazingly good it would all taste!
On arrival at L’Atelier Des Chefs just off London’s Oxford Street we were presented with a cheeky glass of prosecco – which is just always a really good way to start anything, right?! (being a blogger definitely justifies, and possibly even encourages daytime drinking and that is totally not a problem….Hic!)
After a little bit of gossip and bubbles we moved into the gorgeous kitchen with our fantastic teacher, Ibolya Olah, and popped on aprons, ready to start.
The lessons we were doing were 30 minute lessons, which L’Atelier Des Chefs offer for only £15. I think it’s a really clever idea – they even run them to fit in with your lunch hour at work! The idea of leaving the office on your lunch hour, to have a 30 minute lesson in something completely different to take your mind off the office and everything that is going on, eating whatever delicious delicacy you’ve cooked for lunch and heading back to the office within the hour, refreshed and full just sounds incredible, right?!
Our first course was a frittata with a really yummy caramelised cherry tomato sauce so after a lot of chopping up of ingredients (I’m going to get hold of the recipes so I will post them on here ASAP!) we headed towards the hob, and the Tefal Ingenio pans.
I have to admit, before arriving at L’Atelier Des Chefs, I didn’t know a huge amount about these pans – I knew they were meant to be really good quality and quite clever, but really, how different can a saucepan be?! It turns out, VERY! The really clever thing about these pans is that they don’t have handles. You can stack them like cake tins so they take up less space, there are no handles causing dishwasher issues, and leftovers can be put in the fridge in the pan without taking up an entire shelf – Clever, right?!
“No Handle?”, I hear you say, “surely I’ll get burnt!?” – the answer to that is very very simple. No. You won’t. Tefal have created a removable handle, so you click it onto the pan when you are using it, then when you are done and want to wash it, put it in the fridge, or put what you are cooking in the oven, you simply click the handle off again!
I tried this out when cooking the Frittata after the onions, potatoes and other ingredients had been cooked nicely and the eggs had been added, just putting the whole pan in the oven to cook through and I have to say, even I managed to make it work first time – it is so easy! A simple button to click the handle on and off and leave it to cook – that’s it!
By the time it had cooked, we had finished the yummy cherry tomato sauce and so, 30 minutes from starting cooking, we were sitting up at the table, glass of wine in hand, eating this scrummy frittata. Quick, Easy and so so yummy! (And hardly any washing up!)
Our second course was Chicken Shwarama with Flatbreads, minty yogurt and a crispy salad. Just like with our first course, the ingredients were all weighed out for us before we arrived, so all we had to do was get on with chopping and mixing!
The Ingenio Pans came into their own on this recipe, with the chicken only needing sealing on the hob and then simply popping the pan in the oven, clicking the handle off and leaving it to cook away while we got on with salad, yogurt and flatbread making – easy peasy!
I was amazed at how easy it was to make the flatbreads – I think breads are alway presented as being something really tricky to make and I’ve always ended up avoiding making them thinking it takes hours of preparation and complicated water/yeast ratios but these were SO simple!
Literally flour, water and cumin seeds in a bowl, knead until it is a dough, leave it for a few minutes while you whip up a salad and then spilt into small balls, roll out thinly (Top tip from our teacher, Ibloya Olah – roll the dough between greaseproof paper and it doesn’t get stuck to the rolling pin or the table!) and pop in a pan. The non-stick pans don’t need any oil and the flatbreads cooked through in a matter of minutes – so so easy – I’ll definitely be making them again!
All in all, the whole day was brilliant – I met some wonderful fellow food bloggers, learnt new cooking skills (particularly setting aside my tentative attitude towards bread making!), my tummy was filled with some really yummy food and we all felt a real sense of achievement eating something we had made ourselves in such a short space of time.
Tefal very generously also gifted me a set of their pans so I can use them at home, which is pretty fortunate for my wallet as, after using them and finding them so clever and easy to use, I was definitely going to be buying a set anyway!
I will get the full recipes posted on this blog ASAP – you’ve gotta try them! YUM!
For more about L’Atelier Des Chefs, visit https://www.atelierdeschefs.co.uk
For more about Tefal, visit http://www.tefal.co.uk
**This experience and a full set of the fabulous Tefal Ingenio pans were gifted to me, however all views are my own.
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