madbaker | 18 Reasons for porchetta made easy

The upstairs neighbors were kind enough to get me a birthday present spot in last night's class at 18 Reasons. I had never gone to any of their classes; I'm not a member, although I believe the curvy upstairs neighbor is. It was fun. We made a bunch of porchetta-inspired dishes that are quicker and easier than making the real thing. Or even the semi-real thing that I've done, which is a pork tenderloin wrapped in a half belly. I haven't made that again because it feeds 20...

The starting menu for the nine of us: Pork tenderloin in bread; organ-stuffed roast chicken; porchetta-spiced roast rabbit; radicchio-anchovy salad. We also made some pasta with pan dripping sauce and a ricotta-almond pudding.

The class was good. I was on Team Chicken. That took 45 minutes longer to cook than the teacher intended, mostly because of the meat stuffing. It was okay - not spectacular, but fine. The rabbit was quite good. The salad was superb and the pork tasted like a (good) standard porchetta. I will be making the last two at home. I can't make rabbit, as the wife won't eat it. I don't think the chicken is necessarily worth doing.

It was a bit difficult to get up today, because I was awake for a few hours around midnight. The wine converting to sugars, no doubt. But I had fun and learned some things, as well as having good chattage with the other students.