Saturday Night Live!

First and foremost, we tweaked the dish a tiny bit tonight. We gave it another element, and we changed the aioli from an egg based aioli to a traditional potato based aioli. I didn’t know this either, but a garlic aioli was once just garlic, potato and olive oil, and salt and pepper, of course. Nothing more. Ours had a touch of saffron in it, which I think enhanced the color and presentation but barely affected the flavor.

Anyhow, we also added a base of braised fennel under the bass, to give it height, texture, and just another element to the dish. Quite frankly, I think it was great with the fennel, and a great idea on the part of the chef.

We took fennel, sliced it to about ½” and gave it a light salt and peppering. We then browned both sides in a sauté pan and placed it over a bed of sweated onions. We barely covered it with chicken stock, placed a piece of parchment paper over it, and baked it in the oven until it was tender.

When that was ready, that became the base of our fish dish. We then proceeded as we normally did, with the fish on top, the onions and red peppers on top, some of the poaching liquid, and topped it with the crouton with aioli. This time, we made a little herb mound on top, using the fennel tops, which is a beautiful almost dill looking herby green, and chervil and chives. The dish this time looked a lot more impressive than either of the times before. In fact I was bringing up two plates and Chef Xavier calls over to me “Edwin!” I look, thinking I just mucked something up. “Looks great,” while he threw up the international ok symbol (index and thumb together in a circle with remaining 3 fingers up in the air… yeah that one). That was nice.

SO, Saturday night is when it gets busy. In fact the level 6 fish team wasn’t quite a team. It was one guy doing it all by himself, and he was rocking it! We needed to wait a minute or two for him on sending out some dishes, but considering he was by himself, it was pretty impressive. We helped him out in any way we could, but he was pretty set.

Scott and I have been a little shaky on our teamwork until this class. He would tell me to relax a few times because the truth of the matter is I was pretty nervous and things were intense, considering this was my first time in the restaurant kitchen. He has been working in restaurants for a year or so by now, and has a lot more experience. He was right. Our dish doesn’t take long to make, so we had some time before we had to bring out our dish. And the fact of the matter is the bass is really simple. Once the accompaniments are prepared, which is before service time, the rest is simple. Put everything in a sautoir, and then cook the bass for a few minutes.

So the orders start coming in, and I just relaxed. Took it one by one, or 4 by 4, whatever the orders were, and we were smooth sailing. We would plate as a team, prepare the fish as a team (as in lay out the next amount of bass that we might need for the next order). I would place a slice of fennel on the plate, he would lay the fish, veggies and sauce, I would prepare the herbs and so forth.

At first he was the big shot because he’s been in this position, but as we got into our groove and realized this was a piece of cake, we were on the same level playing field. It was a team effort no matter how you look at it. If I went to get dinner, he manned the fish, and vice versa.

About 25-30 dishes later, we got our last order, and we started cleaning up. Out of no where, the order board is clean and down for the night, the executive chef screams out ONE BASS!! I’m thinking, are you serious? And he’s like, “really, one bass, I forgot to call it out.” And sure enough, I prepared one final bass. Thankfully we didn’t throw anything away. Scott gathered some of the things we put away and I took care of the dish. We worked well together.

Now, Chef Xavier. First off, he’s a brilliant chef. On top of his shit, and has a keen eye for details. He took note that there were peppercorns mixed in with our capers. I noticed something looked odd, but he was like, what is this? Why are there green peppercorns in the capers (FYI, they were mixed together in the jar, but labeled as just capers). He’s all over that shit like a Vietnamese whore at a rodeo. (I just used that analogy to respond to one of my bosses. I hope he enjoyed it).

However, last night, the executive chef was yelling some orders to the meat station where Chef Xavier was helping out, and Chef Xavier was screaming back “NO WAY, you ordered only two, we have no more and we can’t make anymore.” Another French Chef was there, working the appetizers, and was like, whoa chez, relax, and said some stuff in French, probably about being in front of the students.

Chef Xavier works 7 days a week, and is one of the few Chefs that still works at a restaurant. He is pretty much the shit. He’s also very nice to us, and respects us, and treats us as cooks not kids. He keeps an eye out for us, and doesn’t let us fall under the bus. We’ll see how this station progresses. After just another class or two, we move right along to the next station. It’s really brief, and kind of scary. But its fun! And it’s not too bad. The 5 hours go by really quickly. Amazingly fast.

Goodbye Level 4

All in all, I must say, the 8 of us in level 4 have pulled off something that, as Chef Rob explained it, could only have been done by dedicated students. And I think we are just that. The 8 of us there have one agenda when we’re in class, and that is to produce a quality product. Chef Rob has explained to our next chef that we are a great class of 8 that works like a class of 16. Chef Janet said many times how sad she was to see us go, and we have to visit frequently. Chef Janet was definitely awesome. She showed us some amazing things that we never imagined doing (making our own bacon and pastrami and ham!!!) Chef Rob also showed us some incredible things and opened our eyes to new techniques and possibilities.

By the way, I believe I mentioned the slow cooked wrapped chicken that Chef Dave Arnold showed us. Well I took some home and fried it up for some friends who were in the house, and they were amazed. I explained I didn’t make it, but it was still fantastic. I didn’t deep fry it, but I did sauté it. And I made a rookie mistake. I got the oil nice and hot, but I failed to dry the skin properly before putting it in. It made for a little more of a mess (splattering), but it also allowed the skin to stick a little to the pan. It wasn’t a terrible thing, the food still came out great, but I should have known better. I realized it as soon as I put it in the pan. I must say, it’s been a while since I did some real cooking, so I need to really think a bit more before I jump right into it. So as a reminder, when deep frying or sautéing, the purpose of the oil is for flavor, color and to prevent sticking. If you do not remove the excess moisture, then you counteract this initiative and there will be more splattering and sticking to the pan.

Anyhow, to be perfectly honest, after we finished buffet, it felt like level 4 was over. And unfortunately that was after the first two weeks of level 4. Family meal was… just rushing to make some food and then not really giving a shit about the rest of class. Most of the time we busted our asses for no reason because people either didn’t need food, or we had our buffets and no one ate the family meal. And then when we got to production, we were never really rushing (except for getting the fish and chicken to the restaurant), but we were doing fun projects like curing meats and the like. Chef Janet was great because she let us focus on the aspects that were important, like the filleting of the fish and the butchering of the chicken, while she maintained the stocks and worked on other projects. And then when we were ready, she let us run the show.

So on our last day of level 4, the buffet guys did an entirely dessert themed buffet. They must have made about 10 or 12 different desserts, ranging from individual cheesecakes, to crème brule, chocolate tarts, bread pudding, ice cream sandwiches, and the list goes on. It was pretty amazing. That meant they weren’t making real food, so the family meal and production group had to step in. We put out our deli meats, a smoked sturgeon and a cheese fondue station for the pastrami. The family meal guys put together a “breakfast for dinner” station. They used some of our molasses bacon that we made. We didn’t let them touch the maple brown sugar bacon. I must say, the molasses bacon was absolutely delicious. I will try the maple bacon this weekend, but I am trying to eat a little better so maybe just a touch.

By the way, the pastrami was phenomenal! The ham and turkey breast were also amazing! Its indescribable, to be honest. Have you been to Katz's delicatessen? Well our meats could have been showcased there. It was quite an accomplishment. I went to party later that evening with the deli meats, and between about 5 people, we finished over 2.5 lbs of pastrami and turkey breast. They were impressed and I was pleased that we were able to make such an impressive product.

But the family meal team was making bacon egg and cheeses on bagels, they prepared lox and set out cream cheese for bagels, they were making omelettes, eggs benedict with a fresh hollandaise, etc. etc. It was pretty great. Oh they also put together a delicious corned beef hash and some tasty home fries. They did a fantastic job.

Oh, how can I forget? One of our classmates, Grace, is a great cellist. Her roommate is a musician as well. So Grace asked her to come in and play violin, and she did just that. It was AMAZING. It was such a classy affair, though we were in a kitchen and many of us were wearing our kitchen whites. Chef Rob was so proud of this class. We consistently raised the bar and produced some quality work. Chef Rob made a reputation for himself as a kick ass level 4 instructor, but he would never fail to mention that it couldn’t have been done with the 8 of us.

On to the kitchen of l'ecole.

Livin Sous Vide loca

SO we’re doing Production now. It’s cool. But let’s put that aside for a moment. We just had 2 lessons at the end of the previous two classes, totaling 3.5 hours on this relatively new method of sous vide and low temperature immersion cooking.

In brief, sous vide is a method of cooking items in a vacuum. We had a pretty large machine that sucked the life and air out of a package and sealed it. It was a large metal container with a glass domed top. You lay a plastic bag inside with the contents that you want to seal airtight and turn the sucka on. In a few seconds you see the gauge reading the percent of air removed. It reaches a 100% vacuum, airless atmosphere. When the machine turns off, and the bag is sealed with its contents, and air returns to the chamber, the bag compresses as much as the contents allow.

So for instance, we put a stack of white bread in the machine, without putting it in a bag, and we sucked the life out of it. Because the bread is so porous, the air was sucked out, but when it was done, the air easily refilled the pores. When we put marshmallows in, the y first started to expand, as the air was sucked out of the middle (since the outside is less porous, the air inside pushed against the inner walls until it broke free. When the machine was turned off the marshmallows just shrunk! And the texture went from light and fluffy to thick and Turkish delight textured. It was actually delicious and interesting. I enjoyed it. However, when we put the bread in a bag and compressed it, the air got sucked out and as the bag sealed and compressed, it just SMOOSHED the bread. So the point is you can’t just put anything in these things without some thought about the texture and what your goal is.

With that said, we tried a few texture modifications, which uses this concept of removing the air and compressing the item, as well as some flavor infusions (including alcohol).

Before we go on, the chef that instructs this course is Dave Arnold, and he specializes in this stuff. It turns out sous vide (vacuum) stile of cooking is not fully understood, and therefore the Dept. of Health won’t allow it to be served to the restaurant without a full HAACP plan. (I forget what that meant but it was something about food safety and storage and serving, etc. I did get a 96 on that test!!) But Chef Dave Arnold mentioned that if he could, we would do A LOT more sous vide cooking if he were allowed. But he sure does experiment all the time and looks for the right temperatures and the right times. It’s pretty scientific, but what’s great is cooking in a vacuum, provided you cook at the same temperature each time and same amount of time, is a guaranteed controlled method of cooking. The result will be the same EVERY TIME. Kind of like that old experiment of a feather falling as fast as a brick… in a vacuum.

So the first day we just did some basic stuff, learned some concepts, looked at some results of eggs cooked at different temperatures. It was amazing seeing the difference of 1-2 degrees Celsius. As I mentioned, if you follow the time and temp (particularly the temperature) it will be the same every time. There is even one stage of egg that the yolk turns into a moldable clay like substance. It holds together like clay and some chefs are using these yolks to sculpt cute little egg things… so we’re told.

As I touched, the beauty of the sous vide method of cooking, and just immersion cooking, is you can cook something and keep it in the water for HOURS, and as long as the water is circulating and the temperature is constant, the product will not overcook! So if you want poached eggs… set them to 62 or 63 degrees Celsius, and use them as you’re ready. They will all be the same. Always.

So the next day, Chef Dave has a rib eye and a piece of prime rib that were cooking sous vide for a while. We took them out, dropped them for less than 30 seconds in a vat of hot oil and pulled out beautifully crisp, tender, perfectly cooked meats. They tasted INCREDIBLE! We also had a whole chicken skin which had some chicken “meat glued” inside, and rolled. That was cooked for an hour or so in an immersion, then we deep fried that for a moment. Incredible. It tasted so frigging good! I brought some home that was unfried, which I will fry up real quick, and it should be super delicious still. The texture of the meat was so tender and moist, but not like fully cooked chicken, though it was fully cooked.

One of the last things we did was some watermelon infused with different alcohols and a vanilla and vodka mixture. Those were pretty good. They were VERY alcoholic, but still delicious! If they had better alcohol, it would have tasted really great.

Here’s where we stand with our creations.
Pastrami – COOKED! We smoked then steamed it, and it smells incredible!
Turkey breast – COOOKED! We smoked it for a while and it’s looking great
Bacons – COOKED! We smoked those too and those too, look fabulous.
Smoked sturgeon – I almost single handedly did this one. I put it in a salt, sugar and dill and onion cure, and then we cold smoked it followed by hot smoking it. It looks fantastic.
Bratwurst – We packaged and blanched some brats, need to cook on Saturday. I brought some home though. Looks great.
Ham – We put it in an immersion cooker and we let it sit over night. Should be fabulous!

Everything is looking good, and tomorrow is our last class of level 4. Oh my. We’re almost in the restaurant.

Production 2

This may be one of the more interesting sections so far. As I have mentioned a number of times, Level 4 is split into 3 sections. Apparently they will be reorganizing and redistributing responsibility of these sections for the classes that follow, however, for now, there is buffet, which is strictly setting up for the 2 buffets that you produce while in that section. There is family meal, which, as its name suggests, is strictly providing food for everyone in the school to eat (including the nights of buffets since not everyone makes it to the buffets). And finally there is production the section I am in now. Production is the least strict section as far as guidelines of what you have to do. Of course the buffet allows creativity, but you are only working on your buffet. For production, you start your night by assessing the stock situation, and checking to see if you need to produce chicken stock or veal stock or a fumet. You also MUST break down the fish and chickens necessary for the restaurant. We’re supposed to have that done by 6:30, but with 3 people working on 3 different things, it gets complicated. Chef Janet understands that the stocks are important, but she actually lets us work on breaking down the proteins and she gets the stocks going. I think that’s really great of her so we can then focus on the more creative aspects which I am going to get into.

By the way, I broke down the cod. After a THOROUGH examination I only pulled out a couple of worms from the fish. I think that’s pretty good!! That is, pretty good that the fish only had 2 worms. It was still gross. The cod was pretty nice to fillet. I think I did a great job. I got all the pin bones out, cleaned it up nicely and skinned it nicely. I was pretty proud of it. I wasn’t super speedy, but hey, it was my first time doing it, and I was trying to do a great job for the guys in the restaurant. I can’t imagine when some of the knuckleheads in Level 3 come to level 4 and break down some busted chickens for us. We’ll see. I’m sure the chef will have something to say if we’re getting poor cuts.

So after all this, we delved right into our projects. We got our second brisket of beef, which I cleaned up and cured with the pastrami salt mixture. Carlos finished up the Boudin blanc we were making (ground it up, seasoned it and got it into sausage casings), and Steve got going on some cures for our ham and turkey breasts.

We literally injected brine with a huge syringe into the ham and turkey and watched the flesh pump up. I think its going to be great. The brines had all kinds of herbs and seasoning. We got those puppies submerged in brine, and now it’s the waiting game.

After dinner, Steve and I prepared two cures for bacon that we will be making. One cure was a molasses cure, the other, which I think will be better, was a brown sugar and maples syrup cure! How does that sound? And you know, it really wasn’t hard. Its something ANYONE can do. Provided of course you buy the belly fat and have the means to smoke it afterwards.

I think, however, the highlight of the night was deboning a whole chicken WITHOUT taking it apart. What’s that? You want details? Sure, why not.

So the first thing you do is cut the wing off at the second joint (as we normally do). Then you take out the wish bone, which, we learned a new method to do, which doesn’t tear into the flesh. Take your knife and scrape away at it. Don’t go jabbing in there and hacking away at the flesh. Just take your knife, scrape, and then use your finger to dig in and get the bone. It was a great new trick, and it worked well.

Once you have that out, prop the chicken up and look at its shoulder. Start cutting and scraping away the flesh. Detach the arm from the shoulder and keep making your way down the one arm bone. Soon you’ll be able to pop the arm bone right out. Get going on the other arm, then don the ribs and around the neck, spine and back. There will come to point when you need to flip it over and star from the bottom of the rib cage and then the thigh and legs. I guess I can’t rally describe it since it’s mostly a process of scraping against bone and cutting around joints. But I assure you, I have a beautifully boned chicken, intact, waiting for a mean stuffing. We’re thinking about stuffing it with seasoned ground pork, which would probably be delicious! She also gave us a brilliant idea of filling it with a portion of pork loin, surrounded by either ground pork or chicken, and then roasted. The beauty of it is being able to have a seemingly whole chicken and slicing across it as if it’s a boneless piece of tenderloin, eating almost every part. This makes a fantastic centerpiece for a fancy meal. You can even stuff it with a traditional stuffing if you’d like.

In all, this is a fun portion of the class. Even though we ran about 20 minutes late since we needed to break down the day time stocks, it was still very fun, informative and creative!

Asian buffet pics

Picture from our 2nd buffet

We Souffléed it!!

What the hell is that supposed to mean? Well the literal translation of Soufflé is to blow up. Therefore, we blew it up! It was a great success, which was enjoyed by all. The flavor of everything was great, but even more so, the appearance was grand. I brought my camera in and shot a few photos. I will get those on here hopefully soon, and you’ll be able to see not only me, but the buffet as well.

I think to sum it up, when all was said and done, Chef Rob took us into the buffet prep room, closed the door and said, I need to be honest with you guys. The FCI hasn’t seen a buffet like this since probably as long as I’ve been here. He went on to thank us for not only the hard work and dedication that made it a success, but for making him look good in front of his peers. Other chefs were complimenting us, telling us that we did a fantastic job.

With that said, I must say, we did rock it like a Vegas whore. Nice analogy, huh? What was amazing was how cool, calm and reserved we all were. We prepped so well, and we were so thorough and organized that we were sitting back polishing off the details, not scrambling before the buffet. At 7:00, an hour and a half before showtime, Chef Rob was talking to another chef saying, "look at this, its 7:00 and I'm chilling back sipping a cup of coffee." We really did hit the high notes. From little things like doming off the top of the fried rice (What you know about dome?), and finishing with scallion blossoms, to laying down a bed of shredded coconut surrounded by orange slices and strawberry halves for our fried dumpling platter.

Let me give you a verbal visualization of some of our platters. I’ll start with more details on the dumpling platter.

I sliced a bunch of oranges. We overlapped slices around the oblong platter, with a few strawberry halves on top and covered the middle with a bed of coconut shreds, and then sprinkled on a small handfull of red peppercorns! Just picture that! It’s such a beautiful and simple presentation. We piled the dumplings in the middle.

For the spring rolls, we sliced cucumbers on the bias, and placed those along the perimeter, sprinkled with black pepper and made a pyramid of spring rolls in the middle. We had a spare refill platter with pea shoots (looked a little like spinach) piled on both ends, with 3 strawberry halves pointing out on top of each pile.

For the Spicy Thai chicken wings, I laid out some greens around a small mound of fried julienned wonton skins and topped that with a crowned orange half.

The raw tuna with taboulleh salsa was laid out diagonally along a mirror platter, simple with no other garnish, and it looked gorgeous. The beef platter (seared, yet raw in the middle with julienned cucumbers inside, and topped with black and white sesame seeds and a rolled blossom of pickled ginger) had an oval pile of the fried shredded wonton skins, and we placed the beef in concentric ovals around it.

The kimchi was served in a round dish, and we alternated overlapping pineapple wedges and orange slices around the perimiter of the bowl.

Oh the pineapples! I took a couple of pineapples and carved spirals going down and around the sides. Along the line of these carvings, we stuck our chicken and beef skewers into the pinapples. People simply had to pull them out, but you had to see how awesome it was. A spiral of skewered meats beautiful riding down the sides of the pineapple. I think it might have been my favorite presentation, though everything was gorgeous.

The duck carving station was magnificent also. Besides the fact that we were butchering the ducks in front of people with a cleaver, we laid out our sliced duck sous vide breast along the 3 sides away from the person butchering, in which he gave a few slices to each person along with the duck. There were also two long skinny platters (about 1.5 inches wide and 1.5 feet long) which we filled with nicely sliced and blossomed scallions for people to take with their duck.

For the duck confit buns, Chef Rob showed me this cool presentation trick with handkerchiefs (cloth napkins?) and aluminum foil. You take a square of aluminum and place it on top of the napkin so that the top side of the aluminum is lined up with the top side of the cloth. Then fold in the top two corner like your folding an airplane. Then fold them in again, and again until you have a thin pointy top, flaring out to thicker bottom. Then start at the tip you just made and start rolling it up. Slightly unroll it and you have a horn looking napkin. Make two of these, put them in opposite corners so the rolled in ends point to eachother and stack the buns up in between. It looked great.

The production group made the whole pig that they were trying to do, and it came out great, and it looked AMAZING! The glaze on the skin was beautiful, and the interior came out great. Their plan to layer different colors of pork was as successful as it could have been despite the problems they had with cutting the fatback. Wait til you see pictures. We also had the ducks hanging from above, and we put some Chinese lanterns and 4 flags up (Vietnam, China, Korea and Japan).

Oh, and last but not least we had 2 fozen ice bowls, one which we served iced tea out of, and another which we rested a bowl of coconut, mango and passion fruit sorbets on. When we froze the ice bowls we placed orange slices, strawberries, rosemary sprigs, lemon slices and other garnish inside, so when we took it out of the bowl it had an array of colors and fruits. It was really phenomenal.

My descriptions barely scratch the surface of the show we put on. As Carlos was carving the duck, Steve was continuously frying up more spring rolls and I was serving the tuna and beef as well as refilling platters, making sure we were stocked. We didn't run out of anything but everyone ate well! I wish I were a journalist or an author, so I can convey these ideas and visualizations a lot clearer and with more passion, but just wait til I get the pictures up!

We now have to get over the hype that we just worked up, and make our way down from the high of such a successful Asian buffet, and bring it back to a classic, beautiful French buffet. Very detail and flavor oriented. I don’t think we can put as much effort as we just put into the last one. Did I mention that I spent about 4-5 hours on Friday night preparing our duck confit buns? Well I did, and they were spectacular.

Aaaaaaaaand… GO!

It’s been a long 7 days since our last class. It was also our last class of Level 2. Everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and cooked their birds perfectly, supposedly. I could write a post on my thanksgiving and all the wonderful food we prepared, but I’ll spare you the glory.

There was a different air in the place. Every time we advance a level, and for that matter, all of the Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday classes, a new class comes in. The last class that came in was only a level below us. The new class is a whopping TWO levels below us. There were people asking ME how to tie their neckerchiefs, and about their side towels. But to be honest, this was not much of a concern. I was thinking about Level 3.

The new class is now on the second floor. The Kitchen is a lot older than the one we were using, but it feels like it has more of what we need. First off, there are about 5 or 6 scales for measuring ingredients. Our last class had, at best, 2. The pots and pans looked a little more beat up and weathered… but that just means they’ve been around and have tasted more food.

Oh, an interesting point to consider. Level 3 is all about consistency and TIME MANAGEMENT. We have 4 sets of recipes that we do every 4 classes. The recipes consist of a soup/appetizer, fish, entrée and dessert. The first 4 classes we work in teams of 2, then we go solo. As a team, we only need to do 2 of the recipes, and when we go solo, we still do 2.

Most importantly, there is a time frame. Chef Rob wants them done at a certain time, and that is a pretty set time. He did state, I’d rather your dishes be 10 minutes late and perfect, than on time and incomplete.

Chef Rob
The first time we met him was in one of our last classes in Level 2. He came up to our class and was pretty strict. Asking why some people had their aprons off while we were still in class. He was very succinct. “I don’t want to see the book in class, you better bring notes, and be prepared.” That was our initial impression. Downstairs in Level 3, Chef Rob seemed really different. He was very nice, and was helping us out, not trying to break our balls or anything. He helped us with our food, and brought us necessary pots. The assistant chef showed us a technique of cooling down our marmite that we were using for our consommé. He didn’t just tell us, he brought us the bain marie with ice. I did not expect such assistance, but it was very much appreciated.

Chef Rob walked around the class assisting everyone, seeing what he had to work with. But as a team’s time approached, he focused more of his attention on them, giving pointers on serving, and finishing the dish. Speaking of which, service is more heavily graded in level 3. Presentation, temperature of the food (as I have learned the hard way with my mashed potatoes), cleanliness of the plate, temperature of the plate, etc., is all scrutinized more carefully. Finger prints on a plate is unacceptable. A bowl of soup is served with a plate and a doily beneath it.

We’re working on the details now. But Chef Rob seems really great so far. He’s enthusiastic and loves to teach, so he said. He is definitely on par with Chef Tom. Most importantly, he was very nice in the critique of our food. We did a pretty good job to begin with, but where we were slightly off, he was very nice in explaining what went wrong and how to fix it the next time.

Moving right along, I was paired up with the new girl. I won’t mention her name yet because I don’t know her well enough to trust that it’s ok. But she was the one who did really well on the test, and I was ready to learn a thing or two. What I do know is that she is quick with the knife. She is confident in her cuts, and makes them quickly. She worked on the julienne and cuts for actually making the consommé, including mixing in the meat and egg whites, etc. I worked on the macedoine garnish for the consommé. The consommé was the first thing to be prepared, with a service time of 8:00. As a refresher, the consommé is a disgusting mush of lean meat, julienned veggies, chopped tomatoes and egg whites, gently simmered in beef marmite. After a little while the mush starts to congeal and form a raft at the top. You have to let the raft collect all the fat and particles and then ladle out the consommé into a chinois, degrease, and serve over the macedoine of vegetables.

Ours was looking great from the beginning, so chef said. Everything was going really well until my partner accidentally cracked some pepper into the consommé. It’s supposed to be peppered before it’s ladled, and only salted afterwards. He said the first thing he tasted was pepper. We also had a little fat on top, which may have been a result of using a fat laden ladle. I also put too many vegetables in the bowl.

It was a little stressful getting the dish served but we did it. Imagine those Iron chefs plating 5 or 6 master dishes in about an hour (including prep work)?! That’s damn impressive.

The next dish we got cracking on was a poached chicken. I don’t feel a chicken, or any meat really lends itself to being poached. But it was actually not bad. I’ll make this description very brief. First we wash, remove the wishbone and wingtips and poach the chicken in cold water. Bring to a boil, and simmer for 2 minutes. Take it out, and put it in an ice bath to stop the cooking. Next we’re supposed to cover with stock and bring to BELOW a simmer for about 20-30 minutes. I mentioned this previously, but I believe most, if not all of the cooking times we are told is more than enough. The chicken cooked in less than 20 minutes, and it was almost 160 degrees, which is ok, but can be considered over cooked. That’s barely enough time to make enough cocotte and prepare the rest of the vegetables that go in the dish.

Either way, the dish came out about 5 minutes late, but everything was cooked perfectly minus that fact that we cooked the potatoes in the broth we served it in, which lent itself to being a little on the cloudy side. Not the end of the world. The food and our plates were hot, and the taste was good, especially considering it was a poached chicken.

After this dish, we were done. Some other people needed to present their apple tart, but we completed our dishes. I feel, for our first class, we did a great job. Chef was pleased with everyone in the class, and we all (including the chef), set a good impression.

I’m not exactly sure what’s on the menu for the next class, but I am working alone. I will be doing the garde manger and saucier positions alone, and I will be on top of my game. This is my first chance to shine, and I’m sure I will. I’m not user when I became so competitive, maybe it was day 1, but I guess I am only out for me. When you work as a team, you obviously succeed and fail as a team, but when you go solo everything that’s great was created from your own to hands, and everything that sucks came from your own ass.

Some words to live by in Level 3: discipline and consistency.

The Quintessential

So this was our first class sans that one guy. It was a little different. The air felt a little more mature, if that’s possible. I know the guy’s partner was happy to not work with him, so maybe that helped the atmosphere. Ultimately, Chef Tom seemed really pleased about it. Not for “failing” or leaving a kid behind, but because he did the right thing and the class was filled with able and intelligent chefs-to-be.

Anyhow, we took our HACCP test. I am writing this post 3 days after it happened, and therefore my mind isn’t preoccupied with the HACCP. In fact it’s preoccupied with the Level 2 final that we’re taking in 2 hours. But you’ll hear more about that later. I'm pretty confident that I passed the HACCP test, but who knows for sure. I did some last minute studying, and I think I secured a few of the answers that could have otherwise had me retake the test. But I'm not worried about it.

I’ve titled this post as I did because these are two of the most popular, and exemplary vegetable preparations in French cuisine. Chef Tom was glad that we had almost an entire class to just these two fairly simple dishes. And after tasting them, I understood it.

The ratatouille calls for a tomate fondue as its base, and, according to the recipe, we add the other ingredients to this base. However, Chef Tom said it’s important that we cook the vegetables separately, and combined them afterwards. I’m not exactly sure why this makes a difference, but I think its concentrates the individual flavors which are then incorporated in the tomate fondue to meld with the other flavors. The eggplant is a little bit of a disappointment. It turns to a mush, but that’s what eggplant does.

I must say, Chef demoed some of the cuts, particularly the pepper tiles, which were about a half inch to ¾ inch squared, and my partner made them about a cm squared. They looked fine, but I was cutting vegetables at ½ inch squared and hers were smaller, and therefore incongruous. Did this make a difference? Not at all. But to me, I was a little disturbed by it. I’m getting a little picky on some things. It can be bad, but when we’re showed something, as Chef repeatedly tells us, it’s to reproduce, practice and learn. Not to do it a bit differently, unless we’re given permission to do so (en votre facon).

Anyhow, we combined it all, let the flavors mesh, and we served it in a round mold shape, with some chiffonade of basil on top. It was gorgeous, and very flavorful, particularly for a mostly brown vegetable mush. The next dish, however, was better, in my opinion.

The Confit Bayaldi was a beautiful pinwheel of colored vegetables baked in the oven on a bed of sautéed onions and peppers. We filled a round ring mold with the onions and peppers and carefully laid out the sliced eggplant, zucchini, yellow squash and tomatoes around like a pinwheel, within the ring. It took a little finesse and time (something you probably don’t have in excess in a restaurant), but it really looked beautiful. The flavors were delicate but together they made a delicious dish.

Considering we only had to make these two dishes, we had plenty of time, and as tradition has been playing itself out, Chef talked to us about his life experiences for the remaining hour that we had.

This was our last class until the final, and our last class with Chef Tom, not including the final and the lecture we were going to have on kitchen equipment. Chef Tom has been our first impression of the French Culinary Institute and to the professional kitchen. And what a good first impression it was. He is indeed a great chef, and despite his military background, is pretty easy going and very lenient. He talked a big talk, but hey, he walked the walk.

We learned a lot from him, and now its time to see what the other master chefs of the FCI can bestow on us. (after the Level 2 test that is)

A taste of Italia at the FCI

Last class we made ricotta and mozzarella for a reason. We were going to use it in our raviolis for this class! That’s to say we made ravioli – the pasta and filing from scratch – gnocchi, risotto and rice pudding! The rice pudding was made from risotto rice, and it was pretty interesting.

Anyhow, the first thing we had to do was make the pasta. It’s pretty darn simple. One egg, some flour and salt, a touch of oil and that’s about it. Mix it together and then knead it like a mofo, for about 10 minutes. Chef told us a pretty nifty trick. Instead of kneading like a mofo, all you really have to do is incorporate it all, give it a minute or so of kneading, and then just start rolling it through the pasta roller, folding it, and re rolling it. This, in effect, replaces the kneading, and it does something else. It gets the dough flat and ready to be rolled after you refrigerate it. This is a pretty nifty shortcut, if nor nothing else, it replaces the grueling kneading step. However, as everyone waited to “knead” their dough on just 2 pasta rollers, I spent the time kneading it. Chef said it was perfect and to just pop it in the fridge. Sweet. Nothing like keeping it old-school.

Anyhow, while the dough rested we did a few things. We started simmering the rice pudding risotto in milk and vanilla. Twice the milk boiled over right under our noses. Not the end of the world, but still, it sucks that we weren’t attentive enough to catch it before it happened.

So as the rice pudding boiled and the dough rested, we boiled, peeled and air dried some potatoes for our gnocchi, made a tomato sauce (similar to our tomate fondue), and started to prepare the ricotta stuffing. It was multi-tasking at its best.

The cheese filling was ricotta, parmesan, salt, pepper, an egg yolk and cream (and a few chopped herbs). Oddly enough, the ricotta which was sitting in the fridge for a couple of days was a little on the dry side. I guess it was sitting in breathable cheese cloth and not in a closed container.

I added a significant amount of cream but the mixture still seemed a little dry. But I didn’t want to over do it because I knew, ultimately, it would melt, which it did, and it was delicious.

We rolled out the pasta dough and made our ravioli. In the interest of time, and for the heck of it, I cut out my ravioli, but I didn’t shape them. Most of the people in class used round molds. I just left them “rustic.” I’m definitely a fan of this approach. It doesn’t affect the flavor, you get a little more pasta, but you also get an old world feel, rather than a cookie cutter, over worked product.

It was really good, and if you like rustic, it looked great too.

The gnocchi was surprisingly delicious as well! I thought it was going to be really bland, but it was quite tasty and had a nice texture. We riced the potatoes, then sifted some flour over it. After making a well, we put an egg or two in the middle and combined it all. Some salt and pepper and working it as little as possible, we combined it all, and rolled out a long log. Chopped the log and straight into the boiling water. A few minutes later, gnocchi was floating at the top, and bam, done.

It was a really productive first half of class. The next half we made a saffron risotto, which is a really simple preparation.

Our Risotto was less colorful than some other people’s. The recipe called for a pinch of saffron. And that’s all we put. However, we were told that in small batches for customers, we should use more saffron so it’s more colorful, and the customer could appreciate it more. It was like the difference in color between an orange and a blood orange. It’s clear the blood orange is a better looking product. I asked to try my classmate’s to see the difference. Very little difference, if any. My partner did however stir in a heck of a lot of butter at the end. It was a ridiculous amount, and I decided she could take it home.

At home we don’t have chicken stock at our disposal, so we just use chicken bouillon. In fact any recipe that calls for chicken stock that I’ve made in the house, I have used chicken bouillon to make a broth. It’s perfect, and adds a nice amount of salt, but not too much (or is it MSG?). But the risotto comes out great.

So we lost that guy in this class. He seemed pretty pissed, but I’m sure he was more pissed after we left and he could think it over and talk with his friends about it. But I think he knows it’s for the best. I think he’s going to redo level 2 when the next class gets to it. Turns out his buddies from Staten Island are in level 1 now, and he will probably be in their class. So maybe it’s better for him. I do know that he is going to act like a know-it-all in their class, but he’s probably gonna be just as bad as he has been, which will piss a bunch of people off.

Who knows, maybe it’s a humbling experience, or a realization. I’m sure he’s going to be a marked man if Chef Tom has his way, but then again, if you got left back, you should be watched carefully to make sure you don’t waste more time and money.

Next class he wave our HACCP/SafeServ test, and then we have the rest of the class to make ratatouille and another classic vegetable dish, confit bayaldi. I’m sure there will be plenty of time to discuss life with Chef Tom.

OH, one more thing. There were two visitors in our class who were making up a missed class and both of them were quite on the annoying side. Particularly this asian guy who was, supposedly, in the middle of studying at med school. He was such a douche bag, and I hope he never makes up a calss with us again. he was so annoying. Which makes me appreciate some of the good people, and friendly, not annoying, characters in our class.

Con queso? Con queso?

So, we were guinea pigs for this class. That is, the first, THE FIRST, class to have a cheese tasting class. Traditionally, they made ricotta cheese, and maybe some others. We not only made ricotta and mozzarella, but we had a pretty well thought out cheese tasting.

Oh, we also had a HACCP review. Did you know that we have our HACCP test on SATURDAY!!! I’m not really worried about it, but still. Everyone should do alright. We had a nice refresher today.

After our refresher, we went right into our cheese course. It was pretty well thought out. We were going to try a linear tasting of 3 main dairy/cheese sources: Cow, Goat and Sheep. So we progressed from the basic ingredient, milk, then to a yogurt, then to a fresh cheese, and then to slightly more aged and complex cheeses.

There are a hell of a lot of characteristics that are pretty bogus. Not righteous or gnarly, but just bogus. Maybe if you have the most disciplined sense of taste and smell you could label some of the cheeses with some of these names. But for the most part, there were about 10 different classifications that repeatedly came up. The one that was the most distinct was “gamy.” That taste of lamb that you can only describe as the taste of “game” was so distinct in the lamb and sheep dairy. The milk, for starters was straight up game flavored. It wasn’t really pleasant. It made cow’s milk seem extremely delicious. This was a constant theme in all of the sheep cheeses. They weren’t my favorites. The cow’s line had some good cheddar and creamy brie like cheese (was it camembert?). The goat has some nice flavors as well, though there was one stank cheese. The flavor was a lot better than the smell. And we had a couple of moldy cheeses which were a lot better than one would think.

Chef asked “so do you think you guys can taste a cheese and know what you’re talking about?” It was one of those rhetorical questions, I knew that. But I said “NO!” I mean, we just took a ½ hour course on tasting a few random cheeses from 3 different animals. Yes I know a little more than I knew, but am I really prepared to contribute meaningful input about a cheese by just tasting it? I really don’t think so. I could probably point out the gamy flavor found in sheep or goat cheese and know its one of those two, but not much more than that.

Either way, it was extremely interesting, and I learned a lot. I’m telling you, there were probably 50-60 flavor classifications. That’ll take some intensive tasting.

Next we made cheese! I’m not sure how much of “making” the cheese we did for the mozzarella, but the ricotta was pretty amazing. We took 2L of milk, added ¾ of a teaspoon of citric acid and some cheese salt, and just heated to 180F, then let it sit. The milk solids coagulated and separated from the liquid, primarily water. After a little while, we scooped out the solids, tied it in some cheese cloth and it’s currently sitting in the fridge.

The mozzarella was a bit different. We started with cheese curds. It was a semi-solid block of curds that were stacked on top of each other and compressed. We took a bowl full of these, chopped them into cubes and added 170F water and some salt. After some stirring they softened and we clumped them together and started stretching them to smooth them out.

So the reason I am skeptical about it is because all we did was stretch the curds in warm water. We didn’t make or prepare the curds or anything. It was a little sad. However, the resulting cheese was very delicious. It was definitely mozzarella cheese. It was stringy with a little chew to it. We left them in balls, but we will be using them for our pasta class on Thursday. We could have made knots, added herbs, rolled them with sliced hams and basil; it’s a pretty versatile cheese.

Well, we have our HACCP test on Saturday, our final on Tuesday and then we come back in a week two level 3! We met our new chef. He seemed a little on the hard side, but Chef Tom said he’s a nice guy. I feel like that one guy who is struggling, may have a hard time in level 3. But we’ll see. We’re also a lot more focused on timing. That is one of my weaknesses. I like to absorb what I’m doing. But I think by this point I have absorbed the basics and the techniques and its time to just “do.”

All Up in my Grille

I've realized today that the point of this blog is to do a little more than discuss how I make food. I feel like I give a pretty good look into what's going on class, but quite frankly, I think I'm too broke to have drinks after class with classmates, and its late by the time we get out of class, and most of the people live outside NY, except the two I already had drinks with. Somehow we decided to get drinks again after Thursday's class (the next class after this post, which is actually tonight), so maybe I'll have something else to say about that kind of stuff. If you're reading this and are interested in anything, please drop me a comment. Like what types of pans we use?, what color nail polish I used to differentiate my utensils?, etc...

Anyhow, we fired up the grill for this class. It was a pretty easy class, to be honest. And I took a very hands on approach, which is what I want/have to do. I did all the grilling for our team, and prepared the chicken. I'll get into it in a second.

The beef we used was a very fresh cut, located right below/behind the ribs. It was a 182, I believe. What the hell does that mean? Apparently, every piece of the cow has a corresponding number. So if you tell a butcher that you'd like a 182, with a 1x1 tail, then you're telling him/her that that you want a certain cut that has been designated as #182, and the tail end of that cut should be approximately an inch thick and an inch long (from the base of the primary cut of meat). At least that's how I understood Chef Tom's narrative. Apparently there's an $80 guide to these cuts. Pretty pricey!

Anyways, the beef was vacuum-packed and looked pretty damn fresh. it had a thick layer of fat on one end, which chef trimmed completely off. He also removed the sinewy silver skin that was between the fat and meat. This is a tough layer that doesn't quite break down without a long duration on the heat.

But because the meat we had was classified as a first category, it lends itself better to a quick cooking style, cooked to medium rare. The categories are First, Second and Third. The second and third are progressively tougher meats, and are usually braised or roasted for longer periods of time so the meat gets tender.

So, what are aged meats? I'll tell you what isn't an aged meat, and that was the piece we had. Ours was fresh out of the package. Aged meats allow the natural enzymes of decaying meat to begin breaking down the meat and therefore making it a bit more tender. Italians can age meat in a cool basement for a while, some put it in high tech "aging rooms." What's better? beats me.

With that said, an aged meat is usually more tender and delicious. Ours was not as tender as butter, but still delicious. We grilled it and put on beautiful quadrillage (diamond shaped grill pattern). Mine was rare/medium rare and very delicious. Before you serve/cut the piece you should always let it rest for a couple of minutes. This allows the blood/juice to recirculate throughout the piece, so it doesn't bleed all over when you cut it, and it makes the more cooked parts juicier.

We served our steak with pommes frites and sauce choron. Sauce choron is a derivative from hollandaise sauce (egg yolks beat over simmering water, then with clarified butter whisked in). into that we put a bernaise reduction (vinegar, crushed pepper, some herbs, then strained) and a little fondue de tomates. It was really perfect on the steak. But that stuff is BAD for you.

We ate this for dinner, and it was fantastic.

Next we did the chicken. I prepared the chicken almost entirely. My partner was more than eager to let me do this. I took the wish bone out this time. Good habits are important. I then cut down both sides of the backbone, through the ribs to remove the back bone and tail. Then I cut out the rib bones and the hip bones. We also cut the drumstick and the thigh at the joint to expose it, and exposed the thigh bone, since that part usually takes the longest to cook. It was pretty easy. I took my time (not my sweet time, but I didn't rush) just to get a grasp on what I was doing. Chef walked by and said "beautiful." Haste makes waste. I brushed the almost boneless chicken with a little olive oil, and we sprinkled a little thyme on it. We let it marinate in the fridge while we prepared the rest of the dish. The rest of the dish was basically a veal stock reduction as the sauce, and pommes pailles (fried haystack of potatoes).

So when it was time to grill the chicken, you put it skin down, and after a few minutes, you give it a 30 degree turn to get the quadrillage going. It looked beautiful! Flip it for a minute or two to get the flesh side going then take it off and bake for 20 minutes. After 20 minutes, you take it out, slightly under cooked, and coat the flesh with a layer of dijon mustard, then bread crumbs (which have been mixed with a touch of oil and chicken jous. Pop them back in the oven for another 10 minutes and hopefully by then, the meat is cooked through (140 degrees or so, and let carry over cooking bring it to 145)

This dish was PHENOMENAL. Better than the steak. I didn't actually taste it until I got home, but it was great.

We had another great class. My partner and I took care of business. The proteins seem easier to cook and prepare than the sauces. I don't enjoy making the sauces since they're easier to mess up and require all types of reducing and ingredients. But you can always add more stock or water if you've reduced it too much.

One guy was upset that his chicken wasn't fully cooked on the grill, and we had to remind him that he was finishing it in the oven. This was after he mangled it. But it was ok, because we cut the pieces apart for service anyways. You just got to pay attention, and read ahead in the recipe.

As I was walking to the train station I ran into Grace, my old partner, and Bret (probably the one who is at the top of the class right now). We decided on drinks for Thursday. I guess I have to take some money out of the bank. I'll let you know how it goes (without disclosing anything too private).

Poisson (not the skull and crossbones kind)

After royally screwing up the potato class, I found it to be in my best interest to ROCK the fish class. The word of the day was to be "Perfection." We rocked it. (My partner was in agreement, we needed to step up our game today)

We also had a quiz. I studied hard (he gives us the study material, pretty much exactly as it appears on the test), and I was very confident that I was going to let the word of the day prevail over the test. Rocked it. It was basically memorizing a few sizes of tourner (bouquetiere -3cm, cocotte - 5cm, vapeur - 6cm), remembering a couple of derivative sauces of mayonnaise and hollandaise sauces (I listed sauce verte and sauce aioli for mayo, and sauce bernaise and sauce choron for hollandaise), lets see, a few methods of cutting and cooking potatoes, and a few things about salads. Piece of cake, especially when he tells you beforehand.

Most of us will pick up a piece of chicken breast (or a piece of beef) and hack away, cutting it down to the lengths and shapes we want. You'll trim the fat, season and cook, without a thought. However, put a whole fish on your cutting board and you may be a little more hesitant. At first glance, it is indeed intimidating. An entire might-as-well-be-live animal for you to cut up, cook and eat.

Well after the filleting demo it was less intimidating. My stomach was feeling a lot better and I was focused (and determined to uphold the word of the day). Normally, you will have to scale and gut the fish. We were using bass and trout, both of which were gutted, only the bass was scaled. Apparently, we can eat the trout WITH the scales, since they are pretty tender. But thankfully he made us scale them. There were scales EVERYWHERE. I was picking scales off myself and the table for the rest of the night. But I'm glad we did it. We then had to cut off the fins (we cut up the bass entirely before touching the trout) and cut out the gills. It was weird touching the lungs of the fish. But I guess its no weirder than touching its ribs... and eyes, and head in general. We used our kitchen shears (not scissors, "scissors are for arts & crafts"), and some of those bass fins were pretty thick.

Behind the gills, there is a bony plate, you start your cut right beyond that to get as much meat as you can, and work your way up along the gills and toward the head. It results in a curved cut that outlines the gills. Then you make long, shallow cuts, trying to keep your blade flush against the backbone and the ribs. You can't do it in one cut, it takes a number of strides. Hopefully, when you're done, you'll have a meaty, not mangled ("it looks like your fillet was attacked by a beaver") fillet. You then trim off any fatty parts and pull out any bones.

I had 4 beautiful fillets. I was very proud of my cuts. I felt very confident, and I was upholding the word of the day.

The first method of cooking was very intricate, and required a lot of steps. Primarily, we had to cook a number of ingredients (veggies) in varying methods. We needed to make our fondue de tomates again (which we burned a few classes ago and wanted to perfect this time, and DID), we needed to julienne celery, carrots and leeks, and cook a l'etuvee, and then finely dice mushrooms and cook down until the moisture was gone.

After you had everything laid out, you took a heart shaped piece of parchment paper and spooned on some tomatoes and mushrooms, followed by the fillet, and topped with the celery, carrots and leeks. Splash some white wine, S&P, and a sprig of thyme, and then fold and seal the parchment paper with egg white. You bake that sack for 7-8 minutes and it poofs up nicely, cooking in its own steam, trapping the aromas for you to open in front of the customer.

It was beautiful, and passed the taste test. Perfect.

The trout was fried. We seasoned the fillet, and lightly floured the fish. We cooked it in clarified butter until barely golden, and nice and crispy, and topped it with a deeeelicious sauce.

We cooked a bunch of butter until it reached noisette stage (hazelnut - lightly browned), then threw in lemon supremes, parsley and capers, and at the last second, tossed some homemade croutons in this mixture and topped the fish. It was delicious! And, again, perfect. Could have maybe used a touch more lemon juice for the acidity, but it was, nonetheless, delicious.

So yeah, the fish was delicious, and we picked up our game. Real interesting right? I bet it is.

I went out for a couple of drinks with a couple of classmates after we were done. We discussed our new partners. At the end of class, Chef Tom said ok.. you, come here, you go there, you, here. He reorganized the class so that we mixed up our partners. It was a tricky move. We did, somewhat, settle into a groove with our partners, and I feel like we paired up with equal skill levels, and the better skilled people were together (I put myself in that category). All that was about to change.

As we discussed this over Bud Light's, I tried not to judge my new partner, as I have not worked with her. She comes off as a little lethargic at times (i.e. during chef demos she leans on the chefs station with her head on her hands, and she speaks very very quietly, not putting any oomph into her statements). Sure its a late class, and we probably all work during the day, but you should show some enthusiasm. One of my beermates mentioned that she looks high all the time. Another good description. My ex-partner was paired with one of the guys who I mentioned previously that I found to be immature, and the other beermate was paired with someone who was about to dump in about 30 grams of black peppercorns in his sauce tonight, rather than capers. That would have been interesting had I not helped him out. They were both worried about working with their new partners, which, I guess deep down, I am too, but they were a little more vocal about it. I'm sure their fears are definitely warranted, but I'm hoping that my new partner has a lot more to her than meets the eye.

We'll find out. Should be interesting. Flat fish on Saturday.

Well let's see...

... there's Fried potatoes, baked potatoes, potato gumbo, barbequed potatoes, roasted potatoes, potato stew, potato soup, potato salad, mashed potatoes... that's.. that's about it.

Ok, so perhaps that was an unsuccessful twist on the Forrest Gump line by Bubba, but you get my point. You can pretty much do anything with a potato (even shoot them out of guns). We certainly did fry them (our first introduction to the deep fryer in class), and slice and dice them. We also used a mandoline for the first time, which proved quite the foe to some in the class (including my partner).

Before I continue, I am having some mixed feeling about Chef Tom. Yes, he is very skillful, and all of his demos come out pretty much perfect, but I think he secretly wants ours to come out not quite as good as his. We all do things at slightly different paces. But he constantly calls us up to the front of the class (mid-preparation/cooking) and makes us watch as he prepares a dish.. from slicing entire potatoes on a mandoline, to laying the slices out, to S&P (salt and pepper, as I write it in my recipes), etc. I agree its helpful to see the process, but certain things can be skipped. More importantly, he calls us up as we're cooking, and inevitably the food is going to burn. It happens to almost all of us. Meanwhile we watch him prepare something from start to finish, and he'll lay it out on a dish and say, "oh wow, did you taste my salad, or my potato, or my_______ (insert name of food he demonstrated). Isn't that good?" Starting to get a little bothersome.

Anyhow, another aside before I get into potatoes. About an hour into class, after we watched him fry a bunch of different cuts of potatoes, I was having some terrible pains in my stomach. I felt like I was welling up with gas, but I wasn't sure why, nor could I do anything about it. With that said, my mind wasn't quite focused on the task at hand. I was more concerned with the clock hitting 10:45 than my potatoes being perfect. Further when my partner sliced her finger on the mandoline, I had no choice but to try and fully focus. It was difficult, and I would love to do it all over.

On to frying potatoes. Its not that difficult, we've all done it, probably without really thinking about it, and most likely without a thermometer (though, if Alton Brown always uses one, maybe I should too). For recipes that call for a one time fry (opposed to frying twice or thrice) the oil should be at approximmately 350F-375F. This provides a crispy outside and helps prevent the potato from adbsorbing too much oil. We made waffle fries (more like chips) using the mandoline (a number of people, including my partner, had a hard time with this cut because they did not realize that you must rotate the potato a little before each pass on the mandoline. Not rocket science). We cooked these in the oil until no more bubbles formed, that is, the moisture has been cooked out of the potato leaving a crisp waffle chip. You can't do this for thicker cuts or else you'll be left with a rock hard piece of fried potato.

We then made a bowl. How cute! ehm... I mean... it was really pretty easy, and its nice to know that we can easily make a bowl out of potatoes. Easily if you have the right tools for shaping the bowl and being able to submerge in oil (we used these two metal "baskets" one for inside the other, so the potatoes were pushed in between. We cut two round parchment paper circles to put between the bowls and the potatoes to prevent sticking. But yeah, it was cute.. and easy). A little tip, when you want to fry potatoes and ou want them to stick together (a hash, these baskets), it may be best that you don't rinse them before you fry them. That is, you can store them in water as you are cutting them, to prevent discoloration, but do not rinse before fying. We don't want to lose the starchy goodness. Also, for frying we use starchy potatoes, such as good ole Idaho's, and Russet potatoes. HOWEVER, it is in yours and your skins, eyes, hands... best interest if you dry the potato before you place in the oil. Again, you probably don't need to be told this, but we were, and I'm passing it along to you. For a regular french fry, it may be best if you rinse off the extra starch, though its not necessary.

Next we made a gratin dauphine. Layers of sliced potatoes, with cheese and cream. It was pretty darn good!! Chef Tom said we used a little too much cheese, but I disagree. It wasn't overcheesy at all. It was, if anything, a little undercheesy. We baked this one in the oven for about 30 minutes, and it got nice and browned on top, a little crispy, as well. Oh yeah, Chef Tom also said the potatoes may have been a little on the undercooked side, which I totally disgree with as well. They were not undercooked, nor al dente. They were fully cooked and delicious. But I suppose he knows best.

What was pretty humorous was for dinner break, they had the audacity to serve us mashed potatoes!! The last thing we needed was more potatoes. But they didn't know, so I forgive them, I suppose.

That new guy, (Lee, whose name is Dongchen, who is a very nice guy) was working alone. He made all the recipes by himself. These recipes weren't difficult, but it took time to gather the ingredients, slice potatoes, fry them, keep an eye on them, prepare supplementary ingredients (like boiling milk), or boiling the potatoes (PLUS having Chef Tom call us up every 5 minutes). He did a good job, considering, however, he lagged behind a bit. But I don't blame him. I helped him clean up his station, but I'd like to work whit him again one day. He was pretty cool, and my partner has been lagging behind a little (though she was super helpful on this dreadful stomach aching potato day).

We made a couple more potato dishes, which I will mention briefly. We made another layered and baked dish (pommes Anna), a hashed potato looking thing (pommes something), pommes puree (mashed), and pommes duchesse (a puree mixed with an egg yolk and usually squeezed through a pastry bag into shapes).

I'd love to give you details but they're a little fuzzy to me, and quite honestly, its easy to mess these up, but if you pay some attention to what you're doing, its easier to get right.

We have a quiz at the beginning of next class. We received the low down at the end of this past class. So we should all do well. I intend on getting it perfect (again). It's idiotic not to memorize the 10 things he takes the time to explain to us for the quiz. I'll let you know how it goes, and if I can stomach it, I'll prepare some potatoes for my friends. Also, by the way, you may have noticed that the blog is no longer white text on a black background. I received a few complaints that it was harsh on the eyes. I am still trying to find the right color scheme that captures the aura of this blog. I am open to suggestions. Feel free to leave a comment with ideas, and with anything else you'd like to say or hear more about.

A whole class on salads?

Yes, an entire class on salads. And quite frankly it may be one of the more important ones we've had thus far (though emulsification was fun and proved quite interesting). If you think about it, depending on what type of cuisine you're having, the salad could be the very first, or very last thing you shove down your pie hole. It could make or ruin a meal. If the first thing you put in your mouth is a soggy piece of lettuce or a big chunk of raw carrot, it could leave a bad taste in your mouth.

To be honest, I sent an email to a few friends who asked me what I've been up to in class. Quite frankly I feel like I wrote what should have been the entry for this blog post, and I may have lost the words after writing it the first time. Hence I am pasting in the bulk of that email so you can get the same passion that went into writing it the first time, rather than a watered down repetition as I feel it may be if I were to write it a second time. Here goes:

The salad dressing is what brings it all together. The key is a temporary emulsification... That is, the oil and vinegar, not having a binding agent, like egg yolks, can only stay in suspension for a short period. the general ratio of dressing is 3:1 Oil to vinegar, plus salt, pepper, and any other herbs or seasoning and flavors (lemon juice, wines, etc..) you want to add. Beat them together with a whisk and they emulsify, though only temporarily, and will need a quick beating before using.

With that said, a salad is anything you want to put in it... the one that may have taken the most time was the salade nicoise. Originally, it was intended to be a rustic salad, everything tossed together and devoured, but in order to charge 15 bucks for it you need to use the finest ingredients and make them look pretty. I really should be writing this in my blog and sending you there... but you're special.. anyhow, this salad consists of boiled new potatoes, hard boiled eggs, anchovies, tuna, and some greens and tomatoes.

FOR EVERYONE'S INFORMATION!! When boiling almost anything, you should try to have like sized ingredients (match the sizes of your potatoes when boiling, a tiny one will turn to mush before a larger one gets soft, and usually boiled separately - turnips cook faster than carrots - as they will take different times despite their sizes), and you start in cold water. This allows the items being boiled to heat up at a constant temperature throughout the entire item - potato, egg, etc. Rather than throwing it in boiling water, flash cooking the outside, then overcooking it just to cook the inside. You catch me? And it doesn't take any longer than the time to boil the water. Also, reduce to a simmer after the boiling process has begun.. the water temperature pretty much remains the same.

The nicoise salad consisted of boiled eggs and potatoes, peeled, seeded tomatoes, peeled, julienned green pepper (yes peeled with a peeler, it was weird), green beans cooked a l'anglaise (boiled in really salty water then shocked in an ice bath, but contrary to my previous statement, the water should already be boiling...) In French cooking boiling/cooking veggies is usually to the point that it is tender. Al dente is too raw. But when cooking these veggies, you usually cook them separately.

(We made a different salad of cooked veggies - carrots, turnips, peas, string beans, all cut to the size of the peas, and we had to cook them individually a l'anglaise. It was a bitch, but that one was really good, we bound them together with mayo that we made and seasoned with salt and pepper.. really good)

So we cooked the peas and string beans, and broke up some romaine lettuce. Plated everything nicely [the potatoes were sliced and laid out in a ring, each slice overlapping the previous slice, with the lettuce piled on top], then topped with some anchovies and chunks of white canned tuna (in water). Dressing was drizzled on everything, though the lettuce was dressed separately by drizzling the sides of the bowl with dressing and gently tossing the salad against the sides. They should not be overdressed!!! or else they get soggy as you all know.

------ The email ended here. I'll continue with some more insight.

The first salad we made was the cooked vegetables bound together with a home made mayo. The veggies consisted of carrots, turnips, peas and string beans, all cut to macedoine size (.5 cm cubed, the string beans were not cubed, just cut to size, and the peas were... well, the size of peas) Each vegetable was cooked a l'anglaise individually because each vegetable takes a different amount of time to cook. But by cutting them to the same size, we could pretty much guarantee that within its own species, the vegetables will all be done when one cube is done.

What differentiated our cubed-vegetables-in-mayo salad from a normal something-in-mayo salad was that the veggies weren't drowning in mayo. The mayo was simply there to bind the veggies together, and for some flavoring. It did not overpower the sweetness and individuality of the vegetables, and having them in uniform sizes was pleasant to the tongue, and no vegetable stood out over the other. It was quite a nice blend.

The nicoise salad, as I mentioned in much detail, was pretty good too, though we avoided eating the anchovies. Close minded? Maybe, but we didn't need 'em. I can't recall anything too memorable besides the salads that we made, but there can't always be drama and me passing judgment on others... boring? Sure, whatever.

eMulsification

Most people have heard the term emulsify, and know exactly what it means. Other's will just smile and nod, having heard the term, kind of understanding it, and just move right along. That used to be me. An emulsification is the binding of two liquids that don't normally combine. The greatest example: oil and water. In this class, we emulsified. We made a few sauces using the standard emulsification process... whipping that bad boy up until your arm fell off.

The usual ingredient that is used to bind is egg yolk. Egg yolk, by some miracle power of chickens, has the ability to hold up to 200mL of oil in an emulsification. We made a few sauces, particularly Mayonnaise and an orange dessert with an orange saboyan (I believe the term saboyan refers to the step before emulsifying a sauce, that is, before slowly whipping in the oil).

The mayo was SO much better than Hellman's and miracle whip. (I wonder why they call it miracle whip? Should we be eating something that must have taken a miracle to create?) It was also extremely simple. It was 1 egg yolk, some salt, some white pepper, a touch of vinegar, and then veg. oil beat into it very slowly.

My team consisted of myself and a new guy from Korea. He started in the day classes and has changed over to the evening program. I can't remember his first name(s), but I do know his last name is Lee, and I am more than happy calling him Lee for the sake of this blog. He spoke in broken English, but I could tell he was a kind person, pretty stylish, and pretty interested in food. He was also very confident in his English, and considering he has not been in the US for too long, it was pretty damn good. He was a good partner, and fun to talk to. Lee had some significant culinary experience, particularly with Japanese and Korean cuisine, which is awesome because I'd like to extract some tips from him on those. Unfortunately Grace went partnerless and had a hell of a lot of whipping to do by herself. She did a good job though.

Anyhow, the mayo was delicious. So delicious I made it again the next night to make a MEAN chicken salad. It was quite flavorful. A delicious fresh mayo can make or break the sandwich, I have come to realize. (I'll keep that in mind for my restaurant). These are the things I came to learn.

The orange dish was memorable. We had to parer a vif the oranges (method of peeling citrus fruits), and then supreme it (cut out the slices from the membranes). What a world of difference it makes when the fruit is completely free of seeds, peel, pith and membranes. The flavor is basically the same, minus some bitterness, but the effort and carelessness that goes into eating it is great. The sauce, however, was key. It was a saboyan of 3 egg yolks, some sugar, some orange liqueur and a splash of grenadine all whipped together to form a foamy froth. Then we folded in (CAREFULLY) some almond flour and mint leaves in chiffonade. (A chiffonade is simply strips of leafy herbs, or lettuce, usually rolled up like a cigar and then sliced).

After laying out the orange supremes in a beautiful pinwheel design, you nap the slices with the saboyan, and then place it under a broiler until it lightly browns. WOW. It was delicious. The oranges did not quite get hot, so they were still refreshing, and the saboyan had great flavor. The almond flour was clutch, and browning it was so good. The mint also threw in a subtle taste, but added so much. Some people topped their dish with the mint chiffonade, though the recipe called for it to be incorporated in the saboyan. I think a combination of both would have been ideal, and a little whole mint leave as a garnish.

There wasn't any drama in the class, though the one guy who missed 3 classes missed a fourth, although he had an emergency and notified the Chef. Not my call to judge, I suppose, but I don't think missing 4 of the first 7 classes is a good thing.

Next class, we do some salads. I think we only do about 3 salads and 2 or 3 dressings... in the entire 5 hours!! So I hope they're good. I assume the prep, which would normally be done way before hand, takes the most time.

As always, I'll let you know how it goes.

OH, by the way, we had a quiz, not a pop quiz. We were WELL prepared in the previous class. And I got a 100. Sweet. I hope he prepares us the same way for the next one. Though I don't really know what a number grade says for a Chef applying to a restaurant. But I'm shooting 100% right now!

Potages

So what exactly is the difference between soup and potages? Well as Chef Tom would put it, about 10 dollars, but nothing more. Its just the French way of saying soup and the way we'll probably put it on our menus since we want to make those extra $10.

In this class we made split-pea soup, potato and leek soup (not creamy), French onion soup (go figure, but the chef primarily made it), and a consomme (a very clear broth, which you wouldn't expect to be clear with all the ground beef, veggies and egg whites you put in there).

Where to start? I guess I'll start with the one I messed up on. Apparently the consomme is a very complicated soup to get right. Its not that its that much more difficult than other soups, but it involves a delicate balance between the amount of stock or broth, amount of meat and amount of egg whites used. I messed up on the egg whites part. As I was running around looking for the egg whites (which came out of a milk carton - did not feel gourmet), I asked a fellow student how much to use. I thought they said 90 grams. I had a recipe card that said 4 egg whites (120g), but at times the Chef will adjust certain things for certain reasons. I also thought I heard the chef say we were only using 90 grams of egg whites (approximately 3 egg whites). The general rule is 3 egg whites per liter. We were using 1.5 liters of beef marmite. I only used 3. My consomme did not form the legendary raft that consommes form. I was embarrassed.

The consomme is NOT supposed to come to a boil, and after stirring and bringing the temperature up to 160-165 degrees, you're NOT supposed to stir anymore. At this point, you should be able to sit back and watch as the eggs start to foam at the top and form a raft. All the julienned veggies and cooked ground beef fuse with the raft. Its quite impressive, and quite disgusting. You wouldn't think that the clearest consomme come from such a murky chopped beef infused soup. For the ones that worked, it look quite amazing. It did not taste like anything special. Just broth. but it looked really nice. Mine never quite left the murky stage. There weren't enough egg whites to form the life saving raft. A little bit like Noah's ark. But none of the boards were nailed in place...

Chef Tom came over to me. I think he respects me, as I respect him. I'm not exactly sure why. Maybe it was our discussion about me going to Vassar college. I'm not just a knucklehead who wants to learn how to cook good. But he didn't lay in on me or ask me "don't you know how to follow a recipe?!" But he explained it the way I rationalized - when you muck up, you learn. I didn't by chance get it right, I got it very wrong. We figured out why, and I'll be damned if I forget that 1 egg white = 30g, and 1L of stock gets 90g or 3 egg whites, when making consomme. I might, perhaps forget about the potato leek soup because I did not do as much work as my partner on it, but I won't forget the consomme.

So I guess the next logical soup to discuss is the potato and leek soup. It was a clear soup, made from chicken stock, with leeks and potatoes. It was surprisingly simple, and as I mentioned, I can't recall exactly what it entailed, as my partner did most of the work. But for some reason I took some home. As I put it in my fridge I was asking, why did I take this soup home? I probably won't like it as much as the pea soup. It just looks like broth with leeks and potatoes. Well I decided to take it for lunch today.. and you know.. it was quite delicious. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I will definitely make it again one day.

I think I have an infatuation with leeks. From the moment I set eyes on them, I knew that I would love them. First off, cleaning them is a b*tch! You need to wash and rewash and rewash until all the sandy dirt that it grows in, comes out. I thought I washed my leek until it was free of sand, but Chef Tom said he felt a little grit. I was unpleasantly surprised. I Really inspected it well for sand and grit. Well, I guess I have to clean it better.

We made a split-pea soup, which was phenomenal. Peas, bacon, herbs... mmmm. I wonder if anyone ground up their cheesecloth of garnish. I was considering it, because the recipe never told us to remove it, but common sense prevailed. I feel like the split-pea soup, which we have come to believe should be a thick soup, is frequently too thick. Chef Tom believes it should be a thinner soup, and I think I agree. It just makes for a more velvety feel. I look forward to eating the leftovers.

MOST IMPORTANTLY, I felt a sense of ease in the kitchen. I felt like I was in more control, despite my consomme follies, and I felt more comfortable. I was confident in my julienned veggies, in my ability to sweat and brown the veggies and bacon, taste and season the soups, confident in how thick I wanted the soups. I was happy with my measuring of ingredients, preparing my station, the soft simmer, the heavy simmer, the boiling of the stocks. Pretty much everything felt better. Am I a pro yet? No way. But am I on my way? Inevitably.