In July 2006, I spent a week at Tuscookany, a culinary school in Italy, exploring the gastronomic pleasure Italy offers. I had been looking for a cooking school focusing on traditional Italian cuisine, but was unable to find one in Chicago (where I live). I am an experienced home cook, but I wanted to take cooking classes to learn more of the techniques that chefs use and master some Italian recipes. After researching several cooking schools in Italy, I settled on Tuscookany for three reasons: the extensive course offerings, the professional-looking website and print materials, and the location.

This is my review of the school based on my experiences.
Tuscookany, a professional cooking school in Tuscany, located in the vicinity of Arezzo market, offers three types of courses: courses that are part of the three day programs and courses for one week. All courses are offered in English. The programs focus on several areas: culinary arts, Master in Italian and Mediterranean Cuisine, wine expertise, Italian baking and pastry.

Their  season starts from Aril to November for the Mediterranean and Italian cooking courses. The weekly programs are geared towards amateurs and home cooks and often combine Italian food from their own vegetable gardens, market tours, wine tastings, and lectures about Italian food and culture.

The course offerings in the programs are quite extensive and range from the basics of Italian cuisine and regional Italian cooking to more specialized courses such as vegetarian cooking, food serving and decoration, and Tuscan and Italian wines.

Details on the school, the programs, and the course offerings are available on their website. Also have a look at the reviews and press articles on cooking class in Italy You can also have a very nicely produced and professional-looking print package mailed: it includes brochures, schedules of classes, course descriptions, the school calendar, a price list, and other useful information about lodging and the city.

Our regional cooking class explore Italy’s various regional culinary traditions; your cooking class can be tailor-made to explore a region in depth. Choose Tuscany with its hearty ribollita, roast game, fabulous Chianti wines. Or perhaps Sicily with its Arab and Greek influenced cuisine: couscous, bottarga, sarde beccafico, tuna and swordfish dishes and cannoli. Maybe you prefer the more delicate dishes from the northern regions of Italy: risotto recipes are many and varied and great to explore. like that from the Po valley, the most fertile area of cultivation in Italy and not surprisingly the area where rice consumption is at its highest. Italy has twenty regions each with unique culinary customs and food. Pick the region, we’ll explore it and prepare some of its best dishes, accompanied by the region’s wines have a look at  the best rated cooking class in Italy.