Sessions 7 - 13

It has been awhile, hasn't it? I've been working and going to school back-to-back for two weeks and have not had the time nor the energy to make an entry. Since there is wayyy too much that has gone on in the 30 or so class hours since I last wrote, I'll just make this brief and let the pictures speak for themselves.
I will leave you with a few cool tidbits I learned, though:

• Add a couple of drops of olive oil to goat cheese to make it more spreadable
  
• The magic number for deep frying is 350ºF
  
• There are only 2 species of oysters. The varieties taste different depending on the water they grow in
  
• When whipping cream, place your bowl atop another with ice to make the process much easier and quicker
  
• Rubbing the little hairs between a lobster's eyes puts them to sleep
  
• When making French Fries, blanch them in unsalted, boiling water first. Salt destroys the potatoes surface.
  
• If you want to save money on lobsters, ask for the "culls" or the ones with a missing pincher. They're almost 40% cheaper.
  

Mayonnaise


Bearnaise


Orange Supremes topped with a sweet Saboyon

A salad of macedoine/cubed vegetables dressed in mayonnaise and topped with goat cheese, and smoked salmon



Salade Nicoise




An example of Tournage/Footbally Vegetables

Potato Souffle Before:


After:


Potato Pancake! (It was Potato Day)







Chocolatey Goodness by those darn Pastry students



Flounder


Up close and ugly


Decapitated





Fried Flounder prep, and a pretty little potato basket


A red bell pepper dipping sauce


Fried parsley for garnish


Yummy Aftermath


Braised Flounder


What's left of a perfect plate of scallops


I tried to sneak this photo without getting a yelling: Chef Phil demonstrating how to kill the "Evil Lobster." "Think of them as cockroaches. They're evil. I once saw a lobster kill a guy on Fifth Avenue," he said


My poor one-armed lobster breathing his last breaths.


Killing him was seriously one of the hardest things for me. My annoyed partner insisted on doing it. I eventually did it, looking away. A knife right between the eyes.


Nothing but butter and a hint of vanilla, lemon, salt, and pepper. Mmm.


Freshly shucked oysters


Chef Wall of Fame

Session Six: Preservation

Chef Phil rearranged the room so that everyone had a different partner and unfortunately- or fortunately- my new partner was absent. So, I had to complete all of the recipes on my own. It also happened to be the one day I forgot to take notes on the recipes beforehand, thinking I could rely on my partner for them. I had to resort to hiding pages from our book under my station. Lesson learned.

It didn't turn out to be a complete disaster. Thankfully the recipes were a bit easier than the soup and sauce days. We watched Chef demonstrate how to cure Salmon, which is surprisingly easy, and I might actually try it at home someday. You basically rub it with salt and sugar, stick it in the fridge for a day or two, then rub it with herbs, brandy, lime zest, and black pepper. Put it back in the fridge under some weights, and the next day you'll have freshly cured cold-smoked salmon.

My first task was to cure duck legs for the first half of Duck Confit. This was the easiest recipe of the day. I just rubbed my little duck legs with salt and herbs, and stuck it in the fridge with everyone else's. On Saturday, we'll continue the confit.

Next, I had to clean and pickle an artichoke. We were instructed to remove all green and purple parts and then simmer them in our pickling solution. Having never handled an artichoke before, I think I may have taken off too much, because it looked like a sad, white lollipop when I was finished, and nothing like anyone else's. Luckily, with my new seating assignment, I was out of the war path, and nobody came to check up on me. So, I snuck my nubby little artichokes in with everyone else's when no one was looking.

Next, we had to pickle four different items and present them to either Chef Tom or Chef Phil. This was also our first time practicing "tournage" or the art of cutting vegetables into "little footballs(see right)." One day when we're tested on this, I know I'll fail miserably.

I presented my plate to Chef Tom, and:

Tomatoes: Overcooked
Zucchini: Undercooked
Cauliflower: Not enough seasoning
Mushrooms: Overcooked

Gah!

Next class is our first test- written, thank goodness. So, I'm off to study now.

The easiest, most delicious croutons you'll ever eat

Ingredients:

• A couple of handfuls of half-inch cubes of bread(It's easier to cut if you freeze the bread first)
  
• Enough butter to coat the bottom of a frying pan
  
• A generous sprinkling of salt
  

Steps:

1. Melt the butter over medium heat.
2. Add bread and toss around until completely coated in butter and all sides are golden brown
3. Drain on paper towels and pour on the salt! Mmm.

Look what cool things the pastry students get to do!

Session Five: Soups

Class was just as I expected Culinary School would be before I actually began: Sweat, (almost) tears, running around like a headless chicken, and a mean French Chef for an instructor.

The funny Chef Phil was not in class, and instead of his sous chef sitting in, we were confronted with a mean French man who was almost disgusted by how little we knew, and who was not kind enough to treat us like adults. Being that it was just our fifth day, you would think he'd cut us some slack. No.

We were to make four soups: Beef Consomme, French Onion, Split Pea, and Potato Leek.

Beef Consomme with spring vegetables

For anyone who has never made a Consomme, it is the most bizarre thing. You start off with a ball of ground beef, mix in some vegetables and egg whites, then throw it into some beef stock and slowly simmer it. As the mass floats to the top, it creates a "raft" which filters the stock. You dig a hole in the center of the raft with your ladle, and slowly ladle stock through the hole to moisten the raft until the stock runs clear. The whole thing looks like a pool of vomit. I think Escoffier came up with this brilliant idea. What strange people those early French chefs were.

After the consomme we made French Onion Soup, which according to our instructor, is very popular in restaurants because it's extremely cheap and delicious.

"You need to work fasteh! Ozerwise you vill not be able to have zis soup for deener! And eef not, well, too bad," said the Chef to our class.

He walks over to my station and peers over me.

"Vut is zis?"

"Onion soup?"

"No! Zis mess! Ow can you work like zis?!"

He took my towel, laid it on a shelf beneath my station, grabbed all my knives and put them on the towel along with my bowl of vegetables.

"And your note cards! You cannot ave them touching ze food! If you are not using somesing, you put it away, yes?"

"Yes, Chef. Thank you."

He looks into my pot.

"Ohhh... your onions could use a beet more color, no? And your garlic is raw! If I bite into ze garlic, then I cannot taste ze soup because all I taste is ze garlic!"

He tastes the soup.

"Ohhhh... I deed not expect such a good flavor. Did you taste eet? Eet's very good."

To the chefs, good seasoning means A LOT of salt. I learned this our first day when Chef Phil told us to rethink our concepts of salt and butter, because we use a ton of it.

My partner and I didn't finish our onion soup in time for dinner, so we alternated between eating our family meal(provided by Level 4 students) and cooking.

The Chef was right- it was pretty good.

After dinner it started to get hot in the kitchen, and I could barely concentrate. My partner took over the more complicated Split Pea soup while I struggled with the simple Potato Leek soup.

The Chef was again impressed by our seasoning, but he did yell at me for not cutting the vegetables smaller. Ah well. So I make ugly, tasty soup. There's still time to improve.

Session Four: Sauces

So, those stocks from the other day- we turned them into delicious, elegant sauces.

We made an Espagnole(brown) sauce(see below), which we reduced to make a Demi-glace. And we also took some of that Espagnole and turned it into a wild mushroom sauce. We took some port and mixed some stock with it and made a port sauce. And we reduced some white wine, mixed it with fish stock, and made a white wine sauce.

The queen of all the sauces we made was a creamy Bechamel sauce, which Chef Tom took, added gruyere and some bowtie noodles, and turned it into the Best Mac N' Cheese I've ever had in all 24 years of my existence. I'll post a recipe once I figure out exactly how it's all made. Basically, you make a Bechamel sauce, turn it into a Murnay, add some bacon and noodles, sprinkle it with Parmesan, throw it in the oven, and Voila!

When Chef Phil was demonstrating how to make the Mushroom sauce, he emphasized that we should not use too much oil. And that's exactly what my partner and I did.

"Isn't that too much oil?" asked my partner.
"You think so?" I asked.
"Yeah... um.. CHEF! Isn't this too much oil?"

Chef comes over, and,
"Holy Jees! What're you tryin to do? Deep fried mushrooms, eh, fat lady?"

Normally I would have been offended by the fat joke, but I figured he must have said it because I am indeed not fat. Right? Anyway...

"Chef, is there any way we can fix it?" asked my oh-so-helpful partner.

Chef: Yeah, of course.
Me: When? Now?
Chef: If you step one foot into horse-shit, what're you gonna do? Are you gonna put the other foot in, too?
Me: No, Chef.

I stepped out of his way, and he dumped the pool of oil and butter into a container, and somehow fixed our mushroom sauce. Miraculously simple.

We finished class with a question and answer session, and I realized that very few people in the class are taking it as seriously as I am. Maybe it's because it's taken me two years and a lot of effort to get here. So, I'm trying to do my best, and hopefully I'll come close to winning the award that recent FCI graduate, and Leann Rimes' ex-husband got- that of top of the class.

Session Three: Stocks

So, it's only been the third day of class, and woooo doogggy, are we scooting along.
We made five different stocks: Beef, Veal, Chicken, Fish(See left), and Vegetable(See below).

The chicken, fish, and vegetable stocks were relatively quick, only taking a couple of hours or less to make, while we had to leave the beef and veal stocks to simmer overnight.
And, at our next class session, we'll magically turn the stocks into flavorful sauces. An important lesson of the night was that we do not season the stocks, because the water evaporates(always simmer with the lid off), and the stocks reduce, so when it comes time to make sauces, they might be too salty.

Diva Dishwasher

At our first class session, we were informed by the Chef that we are only to wash a couple of delicate things ourselves, and are to leave everything else with the dishwasher.

I brought my dishes to the dishwasher that day, and he happily took them off my hands, telling me, "Yes, just put them there."

The next day, however, there was a different dishwasher. He brought in bread from a different class and offered it to everyone, and he was eating cake from the pastry class, and offered some to a girl who sits next to me. I tried some and I'm kind of jealous of the pastry class.

Anywho, I brought my cutting board to the dishwasher, and he creased his brow and asked, "Is this clean? Or did you want me to wash it?"
I said, "Oh, am I supposed to wash it?"
"Yeah, unless you want me to wash it..."

So, I washed my own cutting board. And then he did the same with my plate. So, I washed my plate. He got tired of telling everyone individually, so he raised two plates in the air and announced to the class that everyone had to wash their own plates. And then he went back to eating cake.

At the next class, I confirmed with Chef Phil that we were not to wash our own dishes. But, I'm afraid of the dishwasher, since I sit right next to him, and he brings goodies sometimes. I have to wait until he's not looking before I sneak my dishes over to him.

Session Two: Sanitation, Introductions, and more Chop-chop-chopping

At orientation, Chef Alain Saillac said, "You're going to love every minute of it," and he wasn't kidding. It's just too much fun. Even a class about sanitation, which sounds like something yawn-worthy was actually interesting.

Chef Tim Shaw, former personal chef to celebrities, took over for a couple of hours. My favorite quote from him for the night was, "I heard Star Jones is now dating her chef. That's like an alcoholic dating a bartender. It's just wrong."

I learned some neat things, like:

• Staph is in your ear gunk, eye gunk, and in that nasty white border around your sores, and if someone touches any of these and then handles your food, you could potentially get a Staph infection.
  
• It's safe to eat pork a little pink in the middle
  
• Chicken is the only bird really prone to Salmonella(because of the way we breed them, swimming in their poo) and in a couple of weeks, the class is going to prepare duck with a rare breast.
  
• Star Jones is craaazy.
  

After our little session with Chef Tim, we practiced more slicing and dicing, or Julienne and Brunoise, and capped off the class with introductions.

The youngest guy in our class- and I still can't believe it because he looks older than me- is seventeen. He dropped out of High School to go to the FCI. Shoot, I wish I had done that.

The oldest person in class is a 47-year-old man who is changing careers after being laid off in the auto industry.

Everyone's story was inspirational, and it's great to be involved with all these people that care as much about food as I do.

Session One

So, I wanted to blog each day after class. In a few hours, however, will be Class #2 and I haven't said anything about Class #1.

The very first day, I was spewing with excitement. It was the first time, as a class, we looked around at everyone in full uniform. A girl next to me confided that she was nervous. I was not nervous at all- just very, very excited. I had also thrown back 2 espresso shots just prior, so that may have had a little to do with it.

We met Chef Philip Burgess, our Chef Instructor, and were given our knife kits. Sitting- or standing, actually, since there are no chairs in the kitchen- at the very front, I tried to smile at the Chef to relay my excitement. He did not smile back, and he may have given me a confused look, but definitely no smile. I took that to mean that Culinary School is serious business and there would be no smiling done. So, I straightened up and tried to force my face to be serious. Nope, couldn't do it.

I was relieved when he started class by saying that most students want him to be hard on us, "like the jackasses on Top Chef," but since we were all adults, he would treat us as such. No belittlement? Yay!

Chef Burgess went over most of the aspects of the kitchen, from where our cutting boards were stored, to which bins were compost, recycle, and garbage, to how to clean our stations. We unzipped our knife kits and made sure everything was accounted for. He encouraged us to have them engraved, as things tend to go missing sometimes.

We practiced all sorts of knife skills with our new knives, and were shown how to sharpen them with a special Japanese sharpening stone, which I still need to pick up right now before class today.

And, we got to cook! We did two styles of cooking: A'langlaise and A'latuvee. For the first one, we boiled carrots in salted water, and the other, we did this unusual method of sauteeing turnips in butter, salt, and water, underneath a sheet of parchment. My partner(yes, he gets all the blame) burnt our turnips. Our neighbor was kind enough to give us two pieces of her own so ours weren't a complete sob story. But, that Chef Burgess is all-knowing.

"What happened to these two guys here? Were they sitting on top of the rest or did you get them from someone else?"

At least I made an impression on him because he knows my name now, even though he says it with the tone of a disappointed parent.

The HIGHLIGHT of my day was when I opened my locker at the end to put my shoes away. Inside was a pair of shoes and a note. I thought, "Great. Someone is already trying to claim my locker."

But, the note was from a former student! An act of kindness from a stranger:

Dear future Occupant of this locker,

I'm graduating today and I wanna leave these shoes(clean) and best wishes.

This school is the most amazing school ever. Remember to love what you are doing and always be humble. These are going to be the best months of your life. Take advantage of them. I did pretty damn good and leave this locker full of luck for you.

Best Wishes.

Chef Alexandra Blandora(?)

P.S. Remember to love your class- they are your forever family<3