Ready to learn from the best?

YOU love the food at your favorite chef’s restaurant and may have even bought his or her cookbook. But still, you can’t quite manage to duplicate the dishes at home. If only you could get in the kitchen and learn a thing or two about their technique. Well, in many cases now you can, because more and more restaurant chefs are offering cooking classes.

Thursday night, Alain Giraud, the former Bastide chef whose new brasserie is slated to open this summer in Santa Monica, will teach a class on spring dishes at Chefmakers in Pacific Palisades, where he frequently instructs. Provencal fish soup with pistou, veal with fresh herb butter, and creme caramel are among the dishes he’ll be cooking. “A lot of people are a little afraid to do a caramel,” Giraud says. “I’ll show the way to cook a very nice custard on the stove top, a few steps to stop the burning of the sugar, to stabilize it.” He repeats the class March 29 at Chefmakers’ Manhattan Beach location.

Also at Chefmakers is a class (Monday at Pacific Palisades and Tuesday at Manhattan Beach) entitled “A Sephardic Passover Seder” taught by Michel Ohayon of Koutoubia in West L.A. Ohayon will introduce several dishes for the holiday table including Moroccan-style charoset and braised sea bass with chermoula.

At Chefs Inc. in West L.A. on April 2, Neal Fraser will walk students through recipes for dishes from the menu at Grace, teaching how to use a pasta machine and a pressure cooker as he demonstrates cavatelli pasta with spring peas, Maine shrimp and mascarpone as well as pressure-cooked, braised short ribs with Anson Mills polenta and horseradish gremolata.

On April 6, Neela Paniz, who sold her Bombay Cafe in January, will show students, among other Indian cooking techniques, the proper way to brown onions for a perfect curry and how to prepare lentils for dal.

(Soak them. Spice them at the end, although aromatics can be added early on. And don’t add tomatoes until the lentils are cooked.)

On April 21, Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger will teach a demo-style class at their downtown restaurant Ciudad. Attendees will sip iced tamarind-mint tea as the duo prepares a menu including crab and quinoa fritters, spicy grilled chicken with cilantro sauce and pickled tomatoes, and key lime pie.

At Providence on April 22, Michael Cimarusti offers a class for only the second time since the restaurant’s opening. Limited to 20 students, the class will focus on shellfish and includes lunch. “I demonstrate dishes that are on the menu,” Cimarusti says. “They’re simplified a little bit but not too much. I don’t want to dumb it down.”

Besides, he adds, “It demystifies a lot of it. What might seem daunting on paper, if you see how it’s put together, looks a lot easier than it sounds.”

Also scheduled: Table 8’s Govind Armstrong on April 24 at Let’s Get Cookin’ in Westlake Village; Christophe Eme of Ortolan at Chefmakers locations on May 1 and 7; Brandon Boudet of Dominick’s on May 23 at Sur La Table at the Original Farmers Market in Los Angeles; Erik Oberholtzer of Tender Greens at the Culver City restaurant June 10; and David LeFevre of Water Grill at Chefs Inc. on June 12.

-- Leslee Komaiko

Small bites

* Steve Arroyo, the man behind Cobras & Matadors, plans to open a new spot called 750 ml in South Pasadena on Friday. (The name refers to the volume of wine in a standard bottle.) Fifteen wines will be offered by the glass along with a menu of French and American fare such as duck confit salad and roasted chicken with soft polenta. 750 ml, 966 Mission St., South Pasadena. * Oceanfront, the restaurant at Casa del Mar hotel is closing. Catch opens in its place Thursday with a new look and a new seafood-focused menu by chef Michael Reardon, formerly executive chef at Napa’s Tra Vigne. Catch, 1910 Ocean Way, Santa Monica, (310) 581-7714.

* 3 Square is now open for breakfast and lunch. Among the offerings at Hans and Patti Rockenwagner’s new cafe are leberkas (Bavarian breakfast meatloaf) served with eggs and a pretzel roll, as well as apple pancakes, goulash, sandwiches and salads.

3 Square, 1121 Abbot Kinney Blvd., Venice, (310) 399-6504.

* Wacky Waffles is gone from the strip. On Sunday, Hadaka Sushi opens in its place, with a menu that promises to make you blush. Consider, for example, the nympho, one of several specialty rolls with names that are too vava-voom to repeat here.

Hadaka Sushi, 8226 W. Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, (323) 822-2601.