Have you ever eaten a meal prepared by someone who has cooked for a Queen? 👑 Or had the opportunity to quiz a culinary whiz with your top kitchen dilemmas, whilst being shown how to make a gorgeous 3 course menu and then getting to devour it afterwards? 🍽️

📍The Clevedon Cookery Club, Clevedon

A few weeks ago I went to the second ever demo at The Clevedon Cookery Club and did exactly that! 🤩 Lisa Clarke may be better known as the ‘The Chocolate Tart’ with over 20 years experience in a wealth of professional kitchens (you may even recognise her from billboards in Bristol advertising her chocolatier workshops with Yuup!), but her latest venture is an exciting new addition to the growing foodie scene in our beautiful coastal town, based in her homely kitchen which is just minutes from the seafront.

Running on selected Tuesdays, participants at The Clevedon Cookery Club (there’ll be a maximum of 8) first have the opportunity to enjoy a very warm welcome and morning refreshment in Lisa’s beautiful home.

Lisa has an incredibly well stocked kitchen (as you’d expect for someone with 30 years experience and numerous Taste of the West Awards!) and is passionate about supporting local where possible, so it was no surprise to see a full selection of Drinks Kitchen non-alcoholic aperitifs on offer! (Also award winning, and made just down the road 🙌🏻). She also has a full selection of hot drinks and I’m pretty sure I spotted a Velvetiser too! All soft/hot drinks are included within your experience.

Being a water or wine kinda gal (in the summer at least) I didn’t sample the aperitif, but the rest of the group all devoured copious amounts of the rhubarb flavour and said it was delicious! Cake in the morning however I cannot resist, and the mini red velvets with a homemade lemon curd gave a delightful (if unexpected, I hadn’t read the menu 😆) zing and whet my appetite for what was to come!

Once we’d all introduced ourselves and had a good nose around Lisa’s beautiful kitchen (and garden, where we would be dining later), we sat around her kitchen table. It’s handily placed in front of an island, from where Lisa was then over the next few hours able to expertly demonstrate the menu on offer, allowing us to sample, sniff and take a closer look at each process.

Throughout the demo she told us stories from her incredible career and answered our nitty gritty questions, which were sometimes on topic, sometimes not! Then, we had a wonderful leisurely lunch enjoying the beautifully prepared summer menu she had created, which included the following:

🤍 Smoked Salmon Blinis – fresh smoked salmon on a dill blini with dill mustard mayonnaise

🤍 Chicken Nduja Milanese – corn fed chicken breast with Nduja encased in panko breadcrumbs served cucumber salad, mango salsa and roasted new potatoes

🤍 Strawberry Tart – Crème patisserie encased in sweet pate sucree pastry and topped with fresh local strawberries

Happy to report that everything tasted as delicious as it looked! Dill doesn’t usually float my boat but I enjoyed the starter so much I thoroughly agreed with my companions that I could have eaten it again immediately. But I needed to save room for the Milanese! And I’m glad I did – as that was scrumptious too, and probably the dish that I’m most likely to try at home (using the notes which you can take home at the end!)

I love strawberries but wouldn’t usually opt for a strawberry tart (longtime readers will know my usual line – what is a dessert without chocolate?! 😆) but even I could appreciate the beauty (and skill) that went into this stunner! (Made all the sweeter knowing the strawberries were from The Veg Box).

It was such a pleasure to experience Lisa’s enthusiasm and passion for cooking, and she made every dish incredibly accessible even for nervous chefs like myself! She talked us through the individual components and showed us the best methods (I’ll never cut a lemon the same way again!)

She answered questions on which dishes could be prepped the night before, which bits were freezable, items that were swappable etc… in short she took everything we threw at her and didn’t even break a sweat (on what was a very hot day!)

And whilst she showed us how to make virtually everything from scratch (that dill mustard mayonnaise with the dill blinis 🥹), I loved that when it came to the breadcrumbs she was just like ‘buy them! Who has time to make them?’ 😆

So she understands that sometimes you may need to cut corners. Or even need to save money – in addition to recommending some fabulous local suppliers she gave us top tips for sourcing budget friendly ingredients at supermarkets too (no one should be ashamed to say they go to Aldi!)

The next Clevedon Cookery Club is on the 4th July, then there are dates scheduled for the 15th Aug & 26th September. The experience is £65 a head, with a discount available for groups of 8 who book together.

If you did wish to book as a group Lisa is happy to take suggestions, so for example a recent groups experience was tailored around supporting those with a pre diabetic diagnosis.

Equally if you want to go solo (as I did, and the others on the day I visited!) Lisa is a great host who introduces everyone and puts you at ease so you’ll fast make friends and there was a whole lot of laughter. One of our group was even celebrating her birthday 🥳

Menus change seasonally, access is via a steep staircase and on street parking is available. If you’d like to book for yourself as a present for a friend (I think this would make a fabulous gift!) you can contact Lisa via her social media channels or call/text on 07802 774188.

I was lucky enough to attend on a complimentary basis, but I was under no obligation to write a review (I usually just Instagram – click through for my profile) but did so because I had such a fab time and wanted to shout about the lovely Lisa. If you go along I’m sure you’ll want to tell all your friends about her too!

Thank you for reading.

Lizzie xxx