The Institute of Culinary Education in New York City

Many of you write to me about going to culinary school or cooking classes in your area of the country and I have posted several culinary arts programs and restaurant management schools by state and city on my web site called Culinary Career Path.

Posting the local cooking classes would be much more difficult because there are so many of them and they are often just temporary adult education classes. I did write about how you can find great cooking classes in your area in my blog, Finding Local Cooking Classes.  The article explains where to find local classes that my be just what you are looking for.

Every once in a while I'll be posting career culinary schools and local cooking classes that catch my attention or I've just added to my web site. The one I'm writing about today is The Institute of Culinary Education but I remember it as Peter Kemp's New York Cooking School.

I'm familiar with it because when I lived in New York City I had a temporary roommate who was going to school there to become a professional cook. She was in New York City just to go to this school. I can remember how exhausted she was everyday after working hard at the school only to have to study and practice for the next day. I lost track of Max but I'm sure she is somewhere working as a successful chef. She was very determined to do well in school.

Peter Kump founded the school back in 1975. He was an educator who loved to cook and started the school with just 5 students in his small Upper West Side apartment kitchen.  The New York Times wrote an article about his tiny school and the rest is history.

Who Taught Peter Kump How to Cook?

According to their web site, Mr. Kump learned from some of the best including James Beard, Marcella Hazan, Simone Beck and Diana Kennedy. They all came back later to help teach at his school along with some other notables like Julia Child, Sara Moulton and David Boulet who were frequent guest lecturers and instructors.

The school continued to grow and in 1995 was acquired by Elm View Culinary Enterprises. They changed the name to The Institute of Culinary Education (ICE). Now the school is huge in both space and reputation. They not only teach classes for individuals thinking of becoming professional chefs, they have hundreds of recreational courses on cooking, baking, wine, cooking for kids, international cuisines plus dozens more.