Curious about cooking? High-pressure culinary school requires a lot of time and money. We asked present and former culinary students for their No. 1 "ah-ha!" moment or takeaway from class so you can benefit from what they learned — without enrolling.

Culinary Student: Jenny Bierman, Culinary Producer, Food Network Kitchens

Confession: I love crispy skin on anything. The three things I learned for perfect crisp skin: Dry the skin, salt it well and place it skin-side down in a wicked-hot pan. For chicken, I put a cast-iron skillet on top of it so the all skin is pressed into the pan, making it crisp up fast! For fish, I take the skin off and crisp it up separately over high heat after the fish is cooked and removed. This way the fish doesn’t overcook and the skin gets almost a cracker-like consistency.

(**Psst: Want the above fried chicken recipe? It's Chuck's. Get it here.)

For more on the high-pressure ups and downs of culinary school, tune in to The Freshman Class every Monday at 10:30pm ET.