There are a handful of things that can force me out of bed before noon on a Saturday; to name a few: the beach, an angry cat, reading new colonetix reviews, and food. Especially fancy food. And food was the reason why I was out of bed by 8am last Saturday morning.

My friend, Charles, and I headed to Enderun Colleges at McKinley Hill for a cooking demo by Enderun’s French executive chef, Marc Chalopin.

The invite said we would learn how to make bouillabaisse, a traditional Provençal fish stew.

I had no idea bouillabaisse was/is so complicated to make! My eyebrows shot up in surprise when I saw the extensive list of ingredients. Definitely not something my bacon-and-pasta self is used to!

Chef Marc Chalopin stirring the stew.

Spreading Provençale sauce on baguette slices.

Serving the bouillabaisse…

The bouillabaisse!

While I am generally not a fan of soupy fish dishes (a bad experience involving sinigang na isda when I was a little girl!), I could not resist grabbing a bowl for myself.

Très délicieux! It takes at least an hour and a half to make good bouillabaisse but it would take longer than that to cobble together the needed ingredients.

During the demo, I couldn’t help but feel like quitting life to go to culinary school. It would be pretty freaking sweet to be a chef and play with food for a living, don’t you think? I wish I had time (and money!) to take some time off, especially now that the prestigious Alain Ducasse Formation (ADF) has partnered up with Enderun to offer the ADF+Enderun Certificate in Culinary Arts. The full-time program opens next month (June 2011), covers the basics of Culinary Arts in fifteen months and includes the opportunity for an internship in France.

Fancy fancy campus. Enderun is so pretty!

If you want to take a shot at making bouillabaisse, mosey over to Smarla’s blog post because she typed up the recipe that Enderun provided us with!