When it comes to food, are you one of those people who only knows how to make a mean Lean Cuisine, or is ordering in your specialty? Well, if so, it may be time to stir things up a bit.

Meet Tristin Rumack, a cooking instructor who uses your kitchen as her classroom. Armed with all the ingredients, she will come to your home and teach you to make a meal from soup to nuts.

“I teach personalized cooking lessons in your home,” Rumack says. “I show up at your house, and I will have all the ingredients to cook an appetizer and an entree that we have planned before the lesson. Then we go over everything, which is the combined procedures, which is all the recipes combined to one list from things that take longest to things that take the shortest, and then we start cooking.”

Today’s menu includes seared sea scallops, roasted artichokes and garlic, balsamic red onions and celery root puree. It sounds complicated, but once you make this, you can make almost anything.

“Cooking food is really simple. If you learn how to cook one thing you can usually use that technique to cook a million other things,” says the chef.

Rumack worked as a chef at some of the city's finest restaurants, but had an appetite for teaching. She decided the best way for people to apply what they learn is to teach in a familiar environment.

“It’s fabulous because she is teaching me how to use the tools that I own that are mine,” says a student. “When she leaves you know how to do it again, and you are not left wondering how to do that.”

One of the best things about an at home cooking lesson is that she can help you prepare a gourmet meal and be out the door before your guests arrive.

“Let’s say you are having a dinner party, and you want your friends to think you did this fabulous dinner party all by yourself. I can come in we can prepare all the food together, and I can be out the door before your friends get there and you will have full instructions how to finish the meal,” Rumack says.

Classes start at $$150, which includes a lesson and all the ingredients for a meal for two. The price increases with the number of students and servings.

Aside from gourmet meals, students also come away with their own cookbook, complete with all the recipes and a shopping list.

Rumack offers a suggested menu list that can be tailored for each client. For more information you can visit www.tristinyourkitchen.com.

So if your cooking skills are raw, a private lesson may be a great way to help spice things up.

- Jill Scott