Philomene-Marie,
I accidentally gave you post a "thumbs-down".
About culinary school...I've been warned that it isn't as promising as many believe. One person who is involved in teaching told me that it is as worthless as a BA degree.
However if your goal is to learn how to cook for your family it might be a good choice.
Believe it or not ( and I do because a law school student just read it to me from new admissions information provided by a top law school, last week ) one of the BEST preparatory curriculum choices is a professional level culinary arts degree for those interested in law school. I'm not talking about a mom and pop establishment or a junior college, although some of those can provide decent instruction, but an accredited college program that has a track record of producing REAL chefs capable of working in first-class restaurants during and after graduation with a BA.
The regimen is "semi-military" ( uniforms, set protocols, lots of screaming and yelling at underperformers, etc. ) and a form of "socratic pedagogy" is employed by leading culinary institutes. The faculty chefs, and a number of these are highly paid Executive Chefs at 4 and 5 star restaurants in major cities, constantly force students to think on their feet, reason and problem solve under intense pressure and produce a complicated product. Also critical are personal research skills, done on one's own, very limited, free time. It is a very demanding, 12 to 15 hours per day, 5 days a week, for at least three to four years.
And that, in a nutshell, describes almost exactly what a law school forces its own students to do in order to even hold their place in school, let alone graduate with a JD.