I wish I’d known about this earlier. There’s only one seat left for the November class, but this sounds like such a neat idea, albeit a bit pricey. For $350, you can participate in one of four teams of three people who create their dishes from scratch, and then welcome a guest at the end for a complete dinner with wine pairings. So basically you show up, put on your “complimentary” chef jacket (although something tells me your $350 is covering it), cook up a fancy schmancy dinner, and then your guest arrives and you get to sit down and dine on appetizers and your prepared meal, complete with wine pairings. Very cool. You can learn more about it here.

I recently visited Rathbun’s for the first time and was very pleased with the entire experience—the service was great, the food was excellent, and the atmosphere was nice, especially on the breezy patio and in the airy, adjoining dining room. I think these “interactive cooking classes” sound pretty cool. Has anyone out there participated? It looks like they’ve been going on for a while (since 2005, at least)…I’m just a bit late to the game.