Corn and Lobster Fest: A Shop Rite Culinary Workshop

The Shop Rite grocery-store chain offers culinary workshops in their stores every week. The workshops in our town's store just happen to be taught by our good friend Chef Lise Jaeger. What we love about them (besides seeing Lise!) is that they are hands-on - Chef Lise encourages each and every student to participate in the prep work and cooking. Also, we make 3-5 dishes per class, so it's a great way to gather recipes, get ideas, and learn new culinary skills and techniques. Perhaps the best part of the workshop is, at the end, we get to enjoy the fruits of our labor by tasting all the dishes we helped make. It's fun, delicious and educational!

The workshops are themed, by season (this summer's "Barbecue and Blues"), by ingredient ("Jazzed about Jersey Tomatoes"), or by certain celebrations ("Mother's Day: Something Special for Mom"). Amy has gone to over a dozen of the workshops over the past couple of years, and we have gone to a few together as well. Last week we went to the last one of the summer series, "4th Annual Corn and Lobster Fest." In about 2 and 1/2 hours, we made five recipes, met some new friends, and enjoyed a tasty dinner. Here are some pictures! For more information about the workshops, including locations and schedules, go to the Shop Rite Culinary Workshops home page.

Chef Lise explains the recipe we'll be doing next.

Lobster Garlic Butter, made with lobster roe.

Chef demonstrates the proper way to cut an onion.

Students prepare corn for the next recipe.

Fresh Corn, Lobster and Pancetta Risotto (the favorite of the night) is cooking away.

A student plates the Lobster and Summer Vegetable Bruschetta.

Linguine with Corn and Lobster Sauce - rich and delicious.

Don't forget dessert - Cornmeal-Olive Oil Cake with Roasted Peaches