I think I face the same question. I usually chose what I need most. In my case this means the basic lessons - eggs, salt, rice, how to make stock.

As a service to those of us in Canada, could you please include metric measuremenats as well as US measurements in the recipies and instructions? It would help me tremendously, as I am fairly new to metrics and it can become confusing when I am shopping for ingredients.

Thanks!

There are already quite a few other threads regarding this issue. Simply type in the word "measurements" in the search bar and then look under "forum discussions" and you will see what I mean. Cheers!

Thanks Dawn, I will check the search function as you recommended.

I was wondering how many people actually have an oven that is accurate in temperature. When I bought an oven thermometer (thanks to a Rouxbe blog suggestion), I was surprised just how badly my oven was "off". I set it at 250F to get 325F and when it's on 325F , it goes to 425F. I have a new Breville toaster oven which I really like in spite of the fact that it acts in the reverse way. I have to set it at 300F for it to get to 225F. Don't maunufacturers have to conform to some standard of accuracy or am I just unlucky to have 2 ovens that are so inaccurate. I have adjusted but I wonder how many meals get ruined and cookies get burned etc. out there because oven temperatures fluctuate so badly.

That's a good point Liz. I have been having problems with things burning on the bottom in my oven. I think it is very hot. It just seems that in comparison to the oven I had before. Another couple of things to check are what height you are cooking food at and how thick your oven pans are. That can make a great deal of difference.

I really enjoyed the beef lesson videos and learned quite a bit. However, some of the facts about marbling and cooking don't apply to grass fed beef. As more and more people are buying and eating grass-fed pastured animals, it would be great to see an additional video in this section that addresses the different cooking techniques this meat may need.

Though grass fed beef is less marbled - don't want to get into the politics or health issue here - the techniques are basically the same. However, what I would do differently, with grain fed, than with more marbled meat, is cook the grass fed cuts at slightly lower temperatures to ensure more even cooking. Also, baste the meat, preferably with butter. But other than that, if the meat comes from the same section, apply the same technique you would for grain fed beef.

Discussing grass fed vs. grain fed beef is for more esoteric discussions outside the primary focus of Rouxbe at this point. Trust me, just with vegetables and fish there are many angles to tackle, and we do want to tackle them, but let's keep it simple for the time being. Appreciate your question, Michelle. Food is not just food, it's obviously more. More to come some time in the future.

Thanks..but if you re-read my post you will see I didn't ask for a discussion of the merits of one type od beef over the other. I just wanted to know what trained chefs think about how to cook and handle the meat.

having an ingredient list that was portable for each dish on rouxbe sure would be nice.. then i could use my blackberry or iphone to look up the shopping list ...

This is a suggestion perhaps for the long term evolution of the site:

Could you consider restructuring the recipes à la Julia Child with a basic recipe (with the main video) that is then linked to variants (possibly with their own mini-video)?

For example in Julia's book you'll have a recipe for a very basic onion soup followed by many variants such as the au gratin version.

In some places the site does something like that but what I'm proposing is something more systematic and formal. This should work out well with web technology.

but it is worth repeating. This site is refreshing, a reminder of what the 'Net could be. Thanks for your efforts. The work is very professional and the staff are very responsive to users. It's appreciated out here :-)

I am so happy I finally decided to be a member. It took me so many weeks to decide because I thought of many reasons I do not need Rouxbe: I cook only for myself, my way of cooking is something like macrobiotic food, almost no meat, etc, etc. However, despite all the rational I was always looking for more lessons till realized I really want to learn more and better.

Thanks ROUXBE ,in my opinon that site provide best knowledge and information to culinary and professional people. i really appricate the staff and management to provide the planty information. love u all.....

Great job guys. And great value for money. I love learning the methods and getting to understand them. And being able to do it in my own time is awesome.
I'd also like to suggest metric conversions. Some sort of certification after completion of the course would be very valuable for some of us as well.

Hi Jerzy. Thanks for the suggestions. Both of these features, starting with certification are in the works. Regarding a conversion tool, we simply haven't made this a top priority given all of the other priorities we have at the present time, not because we don't think it's important, but because tools are readily available (note: Rouxbe operations are even based on Vancouver Canada).

Here's a couple of conversion tools for you to bookmark in the interim. We'll get to it though.

http://www.gourmetsleuth.com/cooking-conversions/conversions.aspx
http://www.onlineconversion.com/cooking.htm

Certification is in the works.
Thanks again. Keep on cookin'
Joe

Hi have been having problems with the drop down menus. It frequently is hard to click on any of the options from the menu, It often disappears when the arrow comes of the root menu word when it is coming off the word coming down. It doesn't seem to happen all the time just when it does it makes it sluggish to move around your site.

I just wanted to second Justin's observation: this is happening to me too. It makes it a little frustrating to navigate the site at the moment.
Another thing is that when the Cooking School Lessons page was revamped a couple of months ago, I lost all my progress marks. It's actually been nice to revisit lessons, but I enjoyed being able to see what I'd learned thus far.
Also, I find that it's not so easy to explore the video recipes or text recipes. Quite often, I discover them at random, linked in a discussion or at the end of a lesson. Finding it later on is a challenge. This is not really a site critique..maybe some other members have tips as to how they navigate the site!
After all that, I need to say that the site really is incredibly useful and beautifully produced. The detailed videos that surround me sensorily just give me that much more desire to give it a go. And, Dawn, your voice is gorgeous! I'm glad you stopped saying "al dante" though ;)

The drop down menu is in for repair. It was driving me nuts as well. Thanks for pointing it out.

RE: the progress marks in the cooking school, we did have a couple of users have the same problem. Manille, can you try updating your browser to the latest version? This should solve the problem. If you need help doing this, drop us a note offline using the "Contact Us" link below and I'll provide instructions. They will magically appear (i hope), once you do this :-)

Cheers
Joe

.... to being a little confused about why there is a lesson on cooking polenta yet the video recipe for tarte tatin shows the cook using purchased puff pastry. I checked, and there is no lesson on puff pastry dough.

I understand that this is not a purely French website, but puff paste is not exclusive to French cuisine and surely should be covered before polenta.

I taught myself how to make pate feuillete. It was a bit arduous but I feel really good about having it in my repertoir. I used to think the store bought stuff was a good substitute and that is an oft repeated assertion made by some surprisingly well known chefs. Trust me, it isn't. It is worth every bit of the time and trouble as much for the taste as it is for the confidence building.

Add that to the fact that it's just FUN! Or at least my idea of fun. It's as close to magic as I've seen in the kitchen. I learned to make it on a vinyl tablecloth in Romans-sur-Isere, tutored by a smoking coquette.

Thanks for the answer, Joe- the dropdown is working for me today!
Re: Updating my browser, I am at the most current version..I think I updated last week. Should I do it again with the same version update?

First of all, the drop-down problem has been resolved. Thanks Justin and Manille.

Puff pastry is a course we will likely do down the road. However our focus right now is to complete the basic professionally cooking school curriculum. After this, we will move to more baking and pastry. Expect the same great lessons in this cooking category.

I'm a bit baffled by this. I will have to have our developers look into it. I have the latest firefox browser as well and it seems to be working fine (for Mac though). Just to clarify, the progress icons change color after the page loads (a second or two later). But I guess this isn't happening for you. I will look into it.

Sorry for the inconvenience.
Joe

All my progress since has been recorded fine! I think the site is working properly, it may be just that some of my prior info is gone. Thanks for your concern!