Education & Classes in Coquitlam

In addition to being one of the Pacific Northwest's most well-known equipment purveyors for culinary artists, boasting a retail space that brims with a seemingly endless variety of pots, pans, and paring knives, Cookshop also recruits 100 of the region's top chefs and wine experts to serve on the Cookschool faculty. The school curriculum encompasses a variety of global cuisines—including Thai, Italian, and Indian—and demonstrates the finer points of dessert with classes such as Wilton cake decorating and Chef Survival 101: Self-Defense with a Melon Baller.

At Indigo Food Cafe, vegan chef, café owner, and Ukrainian polyglot Lovena Galyide orients taste buds toward uncooked fruit, nut, and veggie dishes in an effort to jump-start the body's natural healing process. A high tea menu pairs organic, fair-trade teas with bite-size treats including collard rolls, kale chips, and berry cheesecake, and a dinner menu includes collard roll-ups and stuffed portabella burgers. Desserts range from healthy indulgences such as coconut cream pie or lemon goji bars that are also served at breakfast. Lovena also leads classes to help raw foodies bring her café’s nourishing dishes into their own kitchens. During intro classes or more focused sessions on desserts or beauty, Galyide unveils the health benefits and top-hat-decorating potential of figs, coconuts, nettles, and other vitamin-crammed superfoods as her students make and eat kale chips and almond milk and learn to use vital appliances from food processors to dehydrators.

At Purple Castle Brewing's 4,300-square foot brew house, aspiring vintners create their own delicious red and white wines during brewing, bottling, labeling, and corking sessions. Amid rustic wooden barrels and shiny metal vats, seasoned wine experts teach visitors how to ferment, bottle, mature, and kennel-train a batch of fine wine. Patrons crush flavor-filled grapes such as an off-dry German gewtraminer or a rich Australian shiraz, crafting their own labels to slap on their handmade potables. Each 23-litre batch fills up to 30 750 mL bottles and lasts for up to two years, supplying amateur winesmiths with a good start to a collection or plenty of thoughtful gift ideas for any occasion.

In 1993, Ms. Bonny Brown formed Grapefully Yours to bring the secrets of wine- and beer-making to the masses. Today, her dream is housed inside Grape Plus Wine Cellar, which is owned by Betsy Rong. Her staff walks customers through selecting and fermenting their chosen brew—a simple process that can treat palates to dozens of red, white, and fruit mist wines, which fuse juicy flavours such as banana and pineapple. An air conditioner's gentle breeze keeps mixtures cool on their journey from grape to wine before bottle-filling and corking machines ready potables to pour into wineglasses or empty ice-cube trays. Additionally, the staff can emblazon bottles with custom labels or dispense beer kits that let customers create bubbly lagers and ales.

Haely and Juhan Lindau had seemingly unrelated degrees in commerce and molecular biology. But they soon realized how complementary their backgrounds actually were to a career in winemaking and beer brewing. Armed with business and libation-crafting knowledge, the duo flung open the doors of Broadway Brewing and Winemaking in 1992, becoming the first on-premises winemaking shop in Vancouver. At the DIY winery, the owners and their knowledgeable staff guide students of all interests and skill levels through the process of making their own libations, assisting them in selecting the right supplies for home-brewing endeavours before giving them advice on what to do if beer starts drinking itself.