HOT: Knife Skills, Leiths School of Food and Wine, 16-20 Wendell Road W12 9RT

With London suffering from a spate of senseless knife crime at the moment, it seemed sensible for Gourmet Chick and myself to enrol in Leiths' Knife Skills course. Just kidding - Saturday morning had us sharpening knives in preparation for nothing more dangerous than a serious amount of slicing, dicing, julienning, peeling and segmenting for 3 hours. Each workstation in the commercial kitchen had space for eight people and our teacher was very informative and helpful - I now know which knives to use for what purposes, how to do a rolling chop, how to cross chop and how differently chopped vegetables, herbs and fruit have an impact on the dish you're making. Now, if only I could send my sous chef Tim on this useful course! 80 pounds.

HOT: Powerplate at Powertone Studios, 13 Maddox Street, Mayfair W1S 2QG

The vibrating Powerplate machine markets itself as the way to get a 90 minute workout for those with only 30 minutes to spare. However, the trainer at my local gym was pretty unenthusiastic about it, saying it was a gimmick, so I thought I'd try a free introductory class at a proper Powerplate studio. Each exercise only lasted for 1 minute, but after 25 minutes of strength and massage exercises, I was a hot, tired, wobbling mess - I felt like I'd been doing weights for 2 hours and could barely lift a cup to my mouth. Amazingly, I didn't feel sore the next day at all. I'm converted!

NOT: My Chocolate Chocolate Making workshop, B1/16 Baldwin Gardens, Farringdon

I thought a course involving 3 hours of chocolate making would be just my thing. However, our over-crowded class watched the stressed and disorganised guy melt chocolate and caramelise sugar for about an hour before we got our hand dirty - to dip chocolate. I don't need to pay £40 for a lesson in dipping chocolate! So while I was happy with my final products, beautifully packaged in cellophane bags and ribbon, I thought the whole operation was a bit amateurish. If I ever give up the lawyering game I'm going to set up my own chocolate experience class (where the dark chocolate isn't 55% cocoa!). Disappointing overall.

HOT: Raw Food School, 3-4 Archer Street, Soho

A 4 hour talk and food demonstration about the raw and living food philosophy – basically, that to get the full nutrients of food it should not be heated above 44 degrees, and there’s no meat, fish or dairy. Whilst interesting, I really don't think I could do it full time - I like cake and cooking and everything seemed to involve whizzing things in a blender. But I think I will try to integrate more raw food into my diet as the teachers were glowing with supernatural health and energy.

It can’t have had that much of an impact though, as immediately afterwards I went to the Nordic Bakery and ate a chewy Swedish cinnamon bun while sitting in the sun in Golden Square, then bought a potato and olive loaf at my local Baker and Spice - home of even better flaky cinnamon buns and lovely scones.