Eat Drink Talk, Farringdon, London

I think places like Eat Drink Talk are the way forward for small companies or sections of a company to do a spot of bonding. It is a great combo of teamwork, learning a new skill and getting some dinner that you made yourself - without having the chores of shopping for the ingredients or cleaning up afterwards.

You preselect your type of menu - generally most involve a fancy drink/cocktail, starter main and desert by theme. You’re then taught the best techniques to deal with the ingredient at hand, as you watch then do it for yourself. One thing I wasn’t expecting was that you don’t make your own dish - you all chop parts of 2 onions or whatever to make up the whole - so don’t expect to pick out your lopsided cupcake etc. We also were told where we could source the ingredients - and no need to take notes as you’re handed a neat file with instructions for each dish to wow your mates on the weekend. Definitely worth a go, even at the hefty price of £65 a head.

Jennifer is the kind of woman I wish I could hate, but she is just too nice for that! Living in an amazing apartment, teaching people to cook, smiling all the while… if only I could steal her identity!
Alas I cannot, I can only recommend her classes as one of the most entertaining nights I have had in ages. I walked out full, body and mind- my mind housing cool new recipes (don’t worry she gives you a great take home guide with the produce sources and the recipes).
I was there with a group of people and she not only engaged us all individually, making sure we all understood and were involved, she also incentivised us to each have a turn at helping out.
I love Jennifer’s style, I love her apartment, and I love her classes. Clever lady!

Really enjoyable evening - I actually went alone..It was a malaysian cooking night. Jennifer did know a serious amount about the origins of the food..You don’t cook everything from scratch but participate in the preparation of the dishes..The food was amazing, I felt sometimes she could have been a bit more friendly towards her assistant..Just a little grip though..A great/unique evening experience..

Let’s be clear - I am not a good cook. I do a half decent fry up and that’s about it. My cupboards are filled with food stuffs from Dolmio, Heinz and Kraft. I don’t think i’ve cooked an “actual meal” in about 2 weeks.

So imagine my consternation when i was asked to cook the following menu -

Arabian Flatbread with Amlou
Spice Roast Pumkin with Chermoula and Lemons
Chicken, Olive and Sweet Potato Tagine
Couscous with Dried Fruit and Nuts
Orange Almond Cakes with Rosewater Creme Fraiche

I don’t even know what half of those words mean! Thankfully we had the wonderful Jennifer Klinec guide us through the evening as well as provide a decent chunk of friendly banter and stories. By the end of the night i felt fit to burst, a little bit tipsy and a little bit more confident about cooking for myself and my friends (some sort of gourmet fry up perhaps….).

I cannot recommend Eat Drink Talk highly enough. Perfect for an office Christmas party or just a bit of fun with friends. I will definitely be coming back!

Eat Drink Talk’s Gastropub Cooking class was the first cooking class I had ever attended. Being a guy who doesn’t really cook anything other than spaghetti, I had worried about being a bit out of my element. It was a very pleasant and entertaining experience, and I now have the confidence that I can cook the dishes we learned. The class packed a lot of information into what seemed like a short time.
If you don’t want to get overly involved, you can simply observe, or you can roll up your sleeves and get right into things. While you don’t get to perform every single step for every dish, I consider that a good thing. It improves the pacing of the class and keeps things interesting.
The best part of the class is you get to eat everything as you go along, so it’s like going out for a nice meal while learning how to make it yourself. If possible, you should bring a bottle of wine with you to match the dishes you’ll be learning to make. A very unique and positive experience.

My EatDrinkTalk class was jam packed with good information and the hours flew by. I learned a lot of skills that will immediately make a difference in my home cooking, and came away with a full belly, some great recipes, new techniques and kitchen gadget tips. Thanks!

I have been to three cooking classes in the loft studio of Eat Drink Talk in Clerkenwell. After each class, I felt that I wanted to come back for another one because I always had a great learning experience, fun, and excellent food.
I went there twice with a girlfriend and once with my mother! I have to say the one with my mom was the funniest one because I could at least be myself while trying to prepare the lovely meals demonstrated by the talented host. She has a great knowledge of food. I have been to one Vietnamese class, one about Parisian bistro and one Gastropub class and all of them were run very professionally and with a lot of expertise but without the arrogance of a class taught by a used professional chef bored of cooking. I went once, with my mom again (she offers me classes because she thinks it will help me find a girlfriend!) to another cooking school with a well-known chef and it was really a boring and ‘conveyor-belt’. experience. At Eat Drink Talk, it was not and you never once felt that you were bring processed. The small class size makes for a really unique, informal and intimate experience that I just loved!
Eat Drink Talk was fully hands on and I could eat wicked food, drink great cocktails, enjoy my wine and have a great evening. I fully recommend the classes there.

I’ve been to a few of the classes and always found them to be very professionally run, with clear instructions provided in a file for you to take away (always useful when you try and make it a week later). As other reviewers have mentioned - the food is excellent, and given that you are getting several hours of instruction (and a meal) it is a good value evening. I’m a bit surprised by the bad experience that the user “hypens” seems to have had… personally, I would be surprised if classes were not in some way, “prepared, ridged and premeditated” (sic). Perhaps they just didn’t like the instructor!

I took my boyfriend to a class here last week (Thai Food) and we both absolutely loved it. We’d been to a few cooking classes before and we really liked the atmosphere, pace and the way the whole session here was conducted. The food was great too and we’ve already made one of the recipes for a spicy scallop soup.
The class was really well organised and Jennifer is a great teacher. She keeps things moving along really nicely and there is a good balance between eating, chatting and listening and we both felt really relaxed throughout. I also liked the personal touch of being in someone’s home rather than in a commercial kitchen.
I’d really recommend this to people who understand how a cooking class works (i.e. it is NOT a restaurant) and like to be involved and also want to learn a few new things. We’re both really keen to go back!
I really can’t understand the comments made below - are we talking about the same place?

Want to learn how to cook great, tasty food in a beautiful loft flat in Clerkenwell, then eat the amazing grub you just made, and have a few drinks at the same time? Then go to Eat Drink Talk.

The brilliant Jennifer Klinec runs these classes either as private parties or as public cooking classes, where you can learn to cook just about anything from pasta to seafood to dim sum, to curries to middle eastern food...everything.

You turn up at her gorgeous flat, strap on an apron, grab a knife in one hand, a glass of wine in the other and get going. Jennifer makes it fun and interesting and you get to take lal the recipes home with you so you can practice on your loved ones.

And the food is amazing. So simple and quick yet so tasty and moreish. When I went we did the 'best of' Eat Drink Talk so it was a real selection that included lemongrass martinis, spicy squid, dim sum and handmade chocolates. In fact we got through about 6 courses in all.

After I went I booked a class for my wife and 5 of her mates for her birthday and they all had a great time.

Classes are about £65 per person but when you consider you're there for 2-3 hours and you can take your own drinks it's not that expensive for what is a great (and very different) evening out.