I want to continue my other post about choosing a culinary school. While trying to figure out if I prefer London or New-York, reading a little bit about a place called Ferrandi in Paris made me curious. École Supérieure de Cuisine Française – Ferrandi or in short ESCF – Ferrandi is a big school in the center of Paris, teaching about 1500 students each year (most are French students) with a small international program starting twice a year.
The pros:
- Paris, needless to explain.
- This “Anglo” program enables me to learn in Paris but mostly in English (though recipe and quizzes are in French).
- One of the best schools to learn professional cooking in France
- Apparently the FCI (one of the best schools in the US) is sort of an American branch of ESCF – Ferrandi so why not go for the original? (link here)
- The program sounds so cool, 5 month learning on school with monthly regional cuisine learned, culture and language studies, french pastry class every week, excursions, wine classes, workshops and operating the school’s restaurant.
- Mostly hands on training and good ratio between class and instructor (10-14 students per instructor)
- Good value for the money, at least this is what people testify. It’s a reasonable tuition (18K euro which are ~25.5K $) for the amount of class hours (at least 660hr in 5 months before the internship)
- Followed by a 6 months internship in a restaurant as a part of the program.
The cons:
- Very intense studies – same program used to be 9 months and got shorten to busier 5.
- France can be harder to adapt than New-York or London, language and culture wise.
- Application and acceptance is more complicated and can be done in vein if I don’t get in (only about 20 students in the program, It’s not much).
- 6 months internship (maybe too long??)
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| Will I make it in Paris? (this is a pic from Bolivia but still the question stands) |
After weighing it all together I felt confidant about Paris and got really excited about experiencing French cooking in France. The fact that it’s a harder program still scares me a bit, I’m hoping to physically survive the hard bits. Adaptation wise, I decided to start to learn french as early as possible so I can get the most out of studies. Acceptance wise, it took some effort but I did it so no worries there. And about the internship, I will just have to wait to see how it goes.
Good luck in france! I have a friend who's just now in paris in a cooking school for 5 months… do you want to talk with her?
Hi! Mashav nice blog. So i will cu in Paris in the next few months!
Meanwhile, enjoy your time being comfortably living in the home country and exploring new places and sharing your foodie experiences. Bonjour!
Thanks Clair and Michelle :] keep reading
You will be the best mashav!!! I believe in you!
Thanks Sharin! <3
[…] someone missed my post about what am I doing here you’re more then welcome to read here and here. My school starts on 31 of august and I came to Paris two weeks ahead of time together with my […]