Cooking school travels to Bangor Taste of Home class to feature 12 recipes

When Kate Gabriele goes to work, she doesn’t take a briefcase. She takes a kitchen. A home economist and demonstrator for the Taste of Home Cooking School – named after the popular cooking magazine – Gabriele travels with her appliance-packed van, which will show up Thursday at Bangor Auditorium, where Gabriele will demonstrate ways to spice up everyday meals.

The two-hour cooking demonstration will feature 12 recipes, all of which will be handed out to participants in a goody bag distributed at the door. Speaking from her home in Pennsylvania, Gabriele would not reveal the exact recipes she plans to prepare tomorrow but said they will include an appetizer, entree and dessert. After the completion of each recipe, she will draw a name to win the dish.

“It’s a surprise,” said Gabriele, a graduate of the Baltimore International College culinary arts program in Maryland and Marywood University in Scranton, Pa. “But it’s very basic. It’s not gourmet. I am using ingredients your probably have in your cupboard already.”

Gabriele has always had a passion for cooking, she said. Her ancestors in Sicily were bakers.

When her grandparents immigrated, they opened a butcher shop. “Everyone has been in food for generations,” she said. “It comes naturally to me.” But it also bolsters her professional focus on family life.

“It’s important to have a cooking school in these times of stress and separation from loved ones for most of the day,” said Gabriele. “It keeps that time at home for dinner sacred. I like to think that a Taste of Home will keep America cooking and bring families together.”

Gabriele has taught home economics to high school students. Her visit to Bangor is also a collection drive for schools participating in the Campbell’s Labels for Education Program, which provides free educational merchandise in exchange for Campbell’s product labels.

She hopes some cooks in the audience will be from the younger ranks, but cooks of all ages and skill levels show up in Gabriele’s classes, which take place throughout New England. (The home office for Taste of Home Cooking School is Greendale, Wis.) The range makes for exciting interaction between the demonstrator and her students. Participants also can spend the first few hours on the floor, where vendors will be displaying cooking-related goods.

For her own two-hour-plus show, Gabriele will focus on easy recipes that allow home cooks to get in and out of the kitchen quickly so they can spend more time around the table with family and friends.

With the proliferation of TV food shows, magazines and cookbooks in the last decade, America has become a foodie nation, and Gabriele thinks the trend has to do with more than just spices, herbs and fusion cuisine.

“I think it’s about comfort,” she said. “The one thing people turn to when they are sad or happy is food. The best parties start in the kitchen – and usually end up there in my house. Where is most social action centered? Around the dinner table. Even watching people cook is mesmerizing. It’s relaxing.”

The event tomorrow will be the first time Gabriele has been to Maine, and the first time the cooking school has been in Bangor. It moves on the next day to Lewiston and Waterville.

Taste of Home Cooking School will take place Thursday, Oct. 14 at Bangor Auditorium. Doors open at 4:30 p.m. and the show starts at 7 p.m. Tickets are $12. For information, call 942-6588 or visit www.bridal-network.com. Alicia Anstead can be reached at 990-8266 and aanstead@bangordailynews.net.