Sandra: Are you looking for some ways to sharpen your skills in the kitchen and save a little
money as well? Lená is live in Point Loma this morning to tell us about a free cooking class.
Dan: Always looking for ways to sharpen the cooking skills. Good morning.
Lená: Hi, good morning you guys. You know in this tough economy a lot of folks are also 
considering a career change, but then you have to consider the cost of education. Well here
these classes are free. Take a look at this classroom. It's full of folks interested in 
 learning how to cook and maybe even do a career change.We're hanging out this morning with
the cooking class. Chef Sarah who is talking about exotic fruit today. Chef, what are we
going to be  learning? Chef Sarah: Actually, we are talking about exotic tropicals.
 And I have a huge cultural diversity in my classroom which 
inspires me to learn more about the diverse fruits that are available out there, especially
right now in the summertime. We have a very large variety from all around the world. Today, I
wanted to show you just a little bit of a demo on actually how to properly prepare a mango and
also a really neat way to peel a kiwi.
Lená: And these are skills that you're teaching in your classroom that folks can take
and go apply for a job to work in a kitchen or a restaurant and actually maybe even change
careers. These are important. So this is not just like a fun cooking class. This is a cooking
class where you're teaching them things so that they can get another job.
Chef Sarah: Absolutely. Our classes are all very very hands-on, and we really stress the fact
that we try to train people for the industry to make sure they have the proper skills to go in 
the hotels and restaurants and to produce the quality food that is necessary to be a good chef.
Lená: Now I'm noticing that you are using some sort of vegetable peeler. I would have never
thought to use that on a mango. I mangle the mangos and I try to cut them. This is an important
thing you're teaching.Chef Sarah: You could use a 
pairing knife, but what happens is that you actually take more of the inside meat out instead
of just the skin. So if you have a really nice peeler, a vegetable peeler you want to
take just the skin off of the outside. And what you do is just cut the base, so you have a flat
surface. And now it stands on its own. And I've just taken the skin off, so I didn't wasted a
lot of the product.Lená: Nice little mini lesson
there. And taking a look around this place and looking at the equipment. It's really state-of-
the-art. This is a place where not only are people going to learn new skills, there going to
learning them on the best equipment.
Chef Sarah: Absolutely. This is our newest West City campus in Point Loma through San Diego
ommunity College and it's our Continuing Education program. This particular class is
Professional Bakeshop Skills. And we have been blessed to have the most amazing state-of-the-
art equipment that most restaurants and hotels would be lucky to have as well.
Lená: Yeah and Mike was just showing Dan and Sandra these monitors up here where they can
actually see what Chef Sarah is doing. Instead of gathering around they can actually look at
the monitor. That's pretty cool too.
Chef Sarah: Yeah, that's kind of like you basic um, your state-of-the-art cooking schools are
doing now. We have the opportunity to have a demo kitchen and a hands-on kitchen,
which is really cool. We can have 2 different styles of cooking in there.
Lená: That is awesome. I want you guys to also meet Claudia. She's one of the students here 
 in the class. Claudia, you were mentioning that you might be thinking about maybe trying a
career in the culinary arts.Claudia: Yeah, definitely. I
first started taking this class just for fun. It was something to do. It's free, which is great 
right now for somebody my age. And I've enjoyed it so much. It's really rewarding. I've
thought about a career change.Lená: Well yeah, if this class
weren't free probably for most of the people here for many of us probably wouldn't consider
taking it  because times are tough right now and not a lot of people have extra money to be
throwing around.Claudia: Yeah, I would imagine so.
This is a really great resource to have in San Diego.
Lená: So are you going to be making something with this exotic fruit today?
 Claudia: Well yeah, yeah. I'm really looking forward to whatever we're making today.
  We get to take home everything we make which is a really nice treat everyday.
Lená: Yeah, I'm looking forward to it to because I'm really hungry this morning. 
Anyway, you guys take a look at some of this exotic fruit. 
It's very interesting. Um, I wish we had
time to kind of go through all of that with you, but I'll stay here and I'll do the tough work.
I'll do the tasting and sampling and I'll let you know later how it goes.
Are they going to by any chance sprinkle any bacon on top or?
Lená: I'm going to ask her. (laughter) Do you have any bacon here because that's my favorite.
She loves bacon.Chef Sarah: Everything tastes
better with bacon.Lená: Did you hear that Dan?
Chef Sarah. Yeah, she said that everything tastes better with bacon. And she knows.
Dan: Oh, God. You have a partner there.
Bon apetit. We'll check in in a little bit. Thanks Lená. Alright. See you later.
