As one student pushes the glistening white pieces of monkfish gently round the olive oil-coated pan, another places the vegetables – carrots, spring onions, miniature fennel and turnips – into a bouillon made from fishbones. The teacher adds butter to the monkfish pan and explains how to reduce the bouillon after the vegetables are cooked in order to make a sauce.

The dish, to be accompanied by a 2007 Coteaux Varois en Provence and followed by a strawberry and rhubarb desert, has been preceded by “Gambas Minorquine”, (prawns with onion, pepper and a tomato confit) as well as a filet of seabass with bacon and basil. “It’s wonderful to see things that are so simple create something so extraordinary,” says Lionel, one of the students.

Simplicity – and accessibility – are two qualities the new Ecole de Cuisine Alain Ducasse, which opened on Monday in Paris, wants to promote. “Often in people’s minds, gourmet cooking can seem complicated,” says head teaching chef Romain Corbiere, “but we want that cooking to be reproduced by everybody. Our challenge is to be able to deliver this gourmet cuisine in a way that is understood to the general public.”

Vegetables after cooking in the fish bouillon (Photo: Nina Biddle Luna/FRANCE 24)

That's welcome encouragement to those who might be intimidated by the idea of a cooking class in Paris’s smart 16th arrondissement, headed by a famous French chef known - among other things - for being the first to have owned three three-star-ranking restaurants in three different countries simultaneously. But in his new 700 square-metre space Ducasse wants the atmosphere to be relaxed. “It’s a place to get together in for the pleasure of preparing and discovering food,” he said recently.

A discovery enhanced by letting students learn some of the tricks behind the magic of cooking. “Our students all want to learn shortcuts, things to make life easier at home,” says chef Corbiere. “Well, being a chef is all about shortcuts and tricks. So that’s something we can teach them. We will also explain the how and the why of everything. Sometimes you do things in the kitchen out of habit, but you don’t know why.”

A monkfish and vegetable dish, as made from scratch, by students (Photo: Nina Biddle Luna/FRANCE 24)

The school, which buys its produce every day from a local street market, ‘Le Marche de la Rue Gros’, five minutes away, will offer ten courses, running the gamut from “Traditional cuisine” and “Escapist cuisine" to “Gourmet cuisine” as well as classes for children, wine-lovers and pastry-makers. There is even a class that takes you to the market and teaches you how to choose the best produce before coming back to the school to cook it. The average cost of a course is 165 euros for a half day and 280 euros for a full day.

There are two levels, experienced and inexperienced, and classes in the school’s four new, shiny, contemporary kitchens will never have more than 12 students each. For English-only-speaking students, there will be either an English-speaking chef or a translator.

Asked what her favourite part of the day and the “Fish and Seafood” course had been, Marie-Andree, a mother of two, says it is “the way we learned how to cut the fish without damaging its meat. At home you don’t pay as much attention. Here you are slicing and cutting but you also pay attention to how it’s going to look at the end.”

Lionel, who was given the course as a 40th birthday present from friends, said he had been struck by the “smells and the aromas” of everything they had created that day. “It is important in cooking to have both the wonderful cooking smells and the visual part of the meal – it’s a marriage between the two.”

Marion, also a mother of two, says she’s had a memorable day and looks forward to recreating the dishes for her family. “Everyone here is passionate about cooking," she says, "and so it’s been a pleasure to share this.” 

As it happens, one of Ducasse's favourite sayings is: "Knowledge is nothing if it is not shared."