Middle Eastern Cooking Class at Rotorua Arts Village.

I've discovered  a means of  travelling out of Rotorua New Zealand without hopping on a plane or a ship. 
 Who needs a magic carpet when you can go to cooking classes with  other people from all over the world ? 

I've always loved cooking; mostly because I love eating and seeing the smiling face of my husband when I cook his favourite dishes. I'm a  believer that the key to people's hearts is through their stomachs and that sharing food is a great way to break down barriers. 
 
I really like and appreciate the look, taste and fragrance of exotic   food. I try to vary my dishes every week  because I  don't like being a rut dweller. 
 My repetoire includes Italian, Greek, Japanese, German, Indian, Thai,  Chinese, French Provincial, Mexican, Vegetarian, Seafood and good old New Zealand lamb, beef and chicken roasts.

I find it easy peasy  to follow most recipes so I 've never bothered with  cooking classes, unless you count the  bland and boring school ones, I had to attend as a teenager. That is the only time, dishes I made, like  Toad in the Hole or pinwheel scones tasted like vomit material. It's quite surprising how school seemed bent in those days on squeezing the life out of anything that could have been creative and fun. 
 

When I received  Susanna So's  email newsletter  from the Rotorua Newcomers Association, advertising a Middle Eastern cooking class with Palestinian, Nabih Mansour I signed up immediately. 
I knew it would be fun. 

I love the  falafels, hummous, pita bread, pickled cabbage and beetroot that Nabihs sells at the RotoruaThursday night market. Last time I had them I was sitting with an American tourist and she said she'd travelled all over the world and had never tasted falafals that tasted better. 

 Nabih had also attended one of  my six week, beginners acrylic painting classes. 
 He was  a lovely person and I thought it would be great to spend some more time with him. 

 We were to learn how to make flatbread and Middle Eastern vegetarian soup and also to make pizzas out of the flat bread. 
The cost was only $15.00 plus bringing along your favourite pizza toppings. The plan was to share a meal at the end of it together with up to twelve people at the Rotorua Arts Village.


Susanna So,  Co-ordinator of the Rotorua Newcomers Network always sends me her  email newsletters even though I've lived here for over twenty five years. 
 I like to meet new people who come to live here because it gives me a window into another country as I ply them with questions about their lives. 
A large number of people who I teach art and mosaics to come from other countries or other parts of New Zealand. I find them really fascinating

If more of us valued food, cheer and  song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.

JRR Tolkien quotes