Manor From Heaven ; Cook Up a Real Storm On One of Raymond Blanc's Culinary 'Boot Camps'

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MY CURRY tastes like treacle. I had suspected that my Massaman chicken was a little on the sweet side, but the Thai chef's face, now frozen in an expression that is half horror, half contempt, is hinting at the final, fateful verdict. His words do the rest. 'Yuk,' he says.

'Zis,' Raymond Blanc had said earlier, in his distinctive Gallic lilt, 'is a Thai food boot camp. You must all expect to work very hard.' And he wasn't kidding. It's only lunchtime, but already we have cracked coconuts, massaged sticky tamarind and sniffed the ginger-like root galangal (it smells a little like soap). We have also made chilli jam, chopped green papaya salad, sizzled spicy grilled beef, bubbled hot and sour soup and grilled sea bass in fresh green banana leaves. It has been quite a morning.

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Manor From Heaven ; Cook Up a Real Storm On One of Raymond Blanc's Culinary 'Boot Camps'

We are at Raymond Blanc's Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons hotel and restaurant near Oxford attending a one-day Thai cookery course. There are ten of us and we are being taught by Blanc himself and Thai chef extraordinaire Paisarn Cheewinsiriwat. In other words, standards are high.

Standing where I am, surrounded...

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