Chef holding cooking classes
Adam Wasiolek is chef at Glasgow St’s Cuban Belle, but he is also soon to be cooking tutor for Community Education.
Cooking is in Adam’s family. His brother is a chef; his father was head chef at Replete in Taupo for 13 years.
“And it turns out that Dad’s grandfather was a travelling cook with shearing gangs in Australia,” says Adam. “It’s really in the blood. My parents owned a cafe in Kawhia for eight years. We were washing dishes, standing on something to reach the sink.”
Adam freely admits, “Cooking is a tough gig, but I love it. I love cooking people their dinner, I love feeding people. I love the vibe of it.”
He recently took a year off to do something entirely different.
“I enjoyed it, but it showed me how much I love cooking.”
Adam says one of the reasons he took up the profession was because he wanted to travel.
“And I was able to do that. Anywhere you go in the world, you can get a job cooking, if you’re willing to show up and do the stupid hours. I spent four and a half years in Australia and two in the UK.”
He ended up managing a place in Leigh-On-Sea in Essex.
“I was cheffing, making coffee, training staff, serving customers, and I’ve done that in a few places. I like that because you don’t get cabin fever.
“The teaching I’m quite excited about. A lot of cheffing is teaching, because you’re getting untrained [people] and you’re teaching them, so I’m pretty confident about that.
“In the first couple of classes we’re going to be doing things you might bring to a summer barbecue or if you’re entertaining on a summer afternoon — that kind of stuff. First class is savoury and two weeks later we’re doing the sweet one.”
Adam is fond of curing meats so he will show the class how to do a gravlax — cured salmon.
“Lots of cooking is really easy, but that’s one of those things that knocks people’s socks off when you make it. Once you understand how to cure salmon, you can make bacon. Once you understand how to make sourdough, you can make beer.”
He is of the opinion that once you know how to treat ingredients, you can cook anything.
Adam has cooked his share of unusual dishes — frog legs and snails in a French restaurant in England, preparing a bone marrow dish, brain ravioli served on lamb’s fry and bacon, tongue ravioli.
“I’ve eaten plenty of weird stuff. If other people are eating it, I’ll give it a go.”
He says weird food is not that common in New Zealand because we’ve never had to eat it.
“We live in a huge farm and you can’t stop stuff from growing.”
Adam finds cooking at home is a pleasure because there’s no pressure. “That’s what I do to wind down: I come home and cook dinner.”
Adam’s classes are on November 28 (Thursday) 5.30pm8.30pm at St Paul’s Church. First class is savoury finger food for celebrations (Christmas and holidays). $60 pp.
His second class is two weeks later, December 12 (Thursday) 5.30pm-8.30pm at St Paul’s Church. This is also finger food for celebrations, but sweet desserts. If students enrol in both they receive a $10 discount, $110 for both, or $60 each.