This week we made soups. First were consommés. Then cream soups. Of course they were Dalliscious! Bwoop! Bwoop!
I was assigned cream of broccoli. Additionally, my team mate was assigned sous chef for the day so we had to make mirepoix for some veal stock that was being made for the kitchen. For this task I was assigned chopping five onions. That's enough to make me cry so I put on my onion goggles that were given to me as a gift. As I somewhat expected, I got a "You can leave those at home," comment from the chef. Oh well, thought I'd see. Now I know.
First, we organized all our mise en place for the soup. The recipe calls for a velouté sauce to be incorporated thus we had two sets of mirepoix, two portions of clarified butter and two sachet d'épices. The first for the soup and the second for the velouté. The velouté also included roux and chicken broth. The soup mise en place also included broccoli, florets and stems separately, and of course cream.
Mise en place also includes equipment. We gathered our pots, one for the soup, one for the velouté sauce, one for hot water to blanche our florets, an ice bath to shock our florets, a spider to remove our florets and get them into the ice water, a wooden spoon to stir the soup, plus our usual cutting board, trash bin, knives etc.
The chef then announced we'd be making the velouté sauce directly in the soup pot. Sounds good, that's one less pan to wash. He would demonstrate the soup later. My teammate and I started sweating our mirepoix and waiting patiently. Remember, to extract the flavors patience is needed. I added the stem pieces and sweat those. Now we were ready for the velouté sauce, but there was no demonstration. "Chef we're ready to add our velouté."
Now I had to sweat a second batch of mirepoix. It seems this should have gone in at the beginning with the first batch. Oh well. We moved along and added our roux and stock. The soup didn't look very good to me. I was a little worried. It tasted really bland. Chef had told us to season some as we went along and not wait until the very end so I added some salt and pepper.
Meanwhile my partner was blanching and shocking our florets. They looked good, but we had a hard time judging if they were done enough. We were instructed to cook them through and I thought they still had some crunch (which I like). I told my teammate to cook them a wee longer but she should really ask chef if they were done enough. She did. "Take them off." So much for understanding the directions. I was pleased to know he didn't want them cooked more however.
I selected a few appropriately sized florets for garnish and chopped the remaining florets. These we added to our soup. My partner tasted and added salt.
Then the chef shortened our time frame. My partner and I were planning to add our sachet d'épices in 15 minutes and cook for another half hour, per our recipe directions.
"Add your sachet now and cook for another 15 minutes."
Yikes! Is that long enough to draw the flavors out of our herbs? Oh! We have two sachets, one for our velouté and another for our soup, so we have double the herbs. Okay, I'm on board.
We finished up our soup and awaited the emulsion blender from the lentil soup team. I quickly worked to heat our cream so it'd be ready to add to our pureed broccoli soup. All ran smoothly. Now we needed to season. I added some salt and pepper. We tasted again.
"Needs more salt," we both agreed. More salt added.
"Still needs more," I said. I added more salt.
"We just need some to get it to his level." I added more salt.
Next we reheated and plated (or bowled) our soup with our lovely florets for garnish. All the soups are aligned now, minus the white bean. That team was still working.
First was a shrimp bisque. It looked a little thick to me and needed some garnish, but otherwise fine. The chunks of shrimp were inviting.
Second was a minestrone that looked heavenly. There was a pesto on top made from blanched basil leaves, making the pesto a beautiful bright green. It was really nice against the orange carrots and yellow peppers in the soup.
Third was our broccoli soup. It now looked lovely, not like it did when all I saw was floury roux and stock. It was green.
This was followed by the lentil soup. I thought it would look icky, but it looked good. It had bits of bacon on top and nicely squared croutons. I was ready to eat some.
Last was a Manhattan clam chowder. Being a New England clam chowder fan, I wasn't as enthusiastic about this one, but it wasn't a dark red so it still seemed appealing. It also had several open clam shells with baby clams in them which looked yummy.
The white bean soup didn't make it to the table. The student was still working on it behind the scenes, but from the looks of it, very liquidy with a white tint, it wasn't making it to the table anytime soon.
Now to the tasting! The shrimp bisque tasted like wall paper paste, not quite that bad but pastey. It had no seasoning. It reminded me of our soup in the beginning when I was worried about its advancement.
The minestrone tasted as good as it looked, heavenly. There were nice textures from the beans, pasta and vegetables. There was a sprinkle of Parmesan that tasted yummy and the pesto was a huge boost. I could eat and eat this! Most of the class agreed as signaled by the moaning noises when people ate it.
Now ours..... wow. It actually tasted Dalliscious! Chef commented "Nice seasoning, may be a little thick." I could live with that. Plus the class was oohhing, ahhing and moaning some more. To me this was a good sign.
The lentil soup tasted yummy. The bacon and croutons added a nice crunch and flavor. If this was health food I could eat it. Note I said health food not vegetarian. The soup was made with chicken stock and had bacon. My experience with most vegetarian soups is that the cooks don't bring in mushroom broth or another taste to add depth. They are flat. This soup had depth and was tasty!
The last tasting was the Manhattan clam chowder. I dove in. The broth was nice. It didn't seem like a cream soup however. I need to check the recipe, maybe it wasn't supposed to be. I bit into a clam, chewy. Someone added them too early. What a shame as there were several in there to eat.
The one student was still working on her white bean. It looked awful. I think she packed up soon after our tasting. I didn't notice if she participated in the indulgence that followed. We were allowed to take 15 minutes and eat whatever soups we wanted. I went for the minestrone. It was so good! Then had a cup of our cream of broccoli, also good. My now my salt meter was on high. I decided to see if the shrimp bisque would be good with seasoning. I put some in my bowl, added some salt and pepper and tasted. It needed a wee more salt. (I'm turning into a salt monger now. Pathetic.) Now it was good! This I could enjoy. I don't think it was top of the class, but it could earn a much improved award.
Now I need to make the lentil. This will be on our practical. I need to inquire how the croutons were made, did they have garlic, etc.
Next week, it's on to meats! YUM! Bwoop! Can't wait!
I was assigned cream of broccoli. Additionally, my team mate was assigned sous chef for the day so we had to make mirepoix for some veal stock that was being made for the kitchen. For this task I was assigned chopping five onions. That's enough to make me cry so I put on my onion goggles that were given to me as a gift. As I somewhat expected, I got a "You can leave those at home," comment from the chef. Oh well, thought I'd see. Now I know.
First, we organized all our mise en place for the soup. The recipe calls for a velouté sauce to be incorporated thus we had two sets of mirepoix, two portions of clarified butter and two sachet d'épices. The first for the soup and the second for the velouté. The velouté also included roux and chicken broth. The soup mise en place also included broccoli, florets and stems separately, and of course cream.
Mise en place also includes equipment. We gathered our pots, one for the soup, one for the velouté sauce, one for hot water to blanche our florets, an ice bath to shock our florets, a spider to remove our florets and get them into the ice water, a wooden spoon to stir the soup, plus our usual cutting board, trash bin, knives etc.
The chef then announced we'd be making the velouté sauce directly in the soup pot. Sounds good, that's one less pan to wash. He would demonstrate the soup later. My teammate and I started sweating our mirepoix and waiting patiently. Remember, to extract the flavors patience is needed. I added the stem pieces and sweat those. Now we were ready for the velouté sauce, but there was no demonstration. "Chef we're ready to add our velouté."
Now I had to sweat a second batch of mirepoix. It seems this should have gone in at the beginning with the first batch. Oh well. We moved along and added our roux and stock. The soup didn't look very good to me. I was a little worried. It tasted really bland. Chef had told us to season some as we went along and not wait until the very end so I added some salt and pepper.
Meanwhile my partner was blanching and shocking our florets. They looked good, but we had a hard time judging if they were done enough. We were instructed to cook them through and I thought they still had some crunch (which I like). I told my teammate to cook them a wee longer but she should really ask chef if they were done enough. She did. "Take them off." So much for understanding the directions. I was pleased to know he didn't want them cooked more however.
I selected a few appropriately sized florets for garnish and chopped the remaining florets. These we added to our soup. My partner tasted and added salt.
Then the chef shortened our time frame. My partner and I were planning to add our sachet d'épices in 15 minutes and cook for another half hour, per our recipe directions.
"Add your sachet now and cook for another 15 minutes."
Yikes! Is that long enough to draw the flavors out of our herbs? Oh! We have two sachets, one for our velouté and another for our soup, so we have double the herbs. Okay, I'm on board.
We finished up our soup and awaited the emulsion blender from the lentil soup team. I quickly worked to heat our cream so it'd be ready to add to our pureed broccoli soup. All ran smoothly. Now we needed to season. I added some salt and pepper. We tasted again.
"Needs more salt," we both agreed. More salt added.
"Still needs more," I said. I added more salt.
"We just need some to get it to his level." I added more salt.
Next we reheated and plated (or bowled) our soup with our lovely florets for garnish. All the soups are aligned now, minus the white bean. That team was still working.
First was a shrimp bisque. It looked a little thick to me and needed some garnish, but otherwise fine. The chunks of shrimp were inviting.
Second was a minestrone that looked heavenly. There was a pesto on top made from blanched basil leaves, making the pesto a beautiful bright green. It was really nice against the orange carrots and yellow peppers in the soup.
Third was our broccoli soup. It now looked lovely, not like it did when all I saw was floury roux and stock. It was green.
This was followed by the lentil soup. I thought it would look icky, but it looked good. It had bits of bacon on top and nicely squared croutons. I was ready to eat some.
Last was a Manhattan clam chowder. Being a New England clam chowder fan, I wasn't as enthusiastic about this one, but it wasn't a dark red so it still seemed appealing. It also had several open clam shells with baby clams in them which looked yummy.
The white bean soup didn't make it to the table. The student was still working on it behind the scenes, but from the looks of it, very liquidy with a white tint, it wasn't making it to the table anytime soon.
Now to the tasting! The shrimp bisque tasted like wall paper paste, not quite that bad but pastey. It had no seasoning. It reminded me of our soup in the beginning when I was worried about its advancement.
The minestrone tasted as good as it looked, heavenly. There were nice textures from the beans, pasta and vegetables. There was a sprinkle of Parmesan that tasted yummy and the pesto was a huge boost. I could eat and eat this! Most of the class agreed as signaled by the moaning noises when people ate it.
Now ours..... wow. It actually tasted Dalliscious! Chef commented "Nice seasoning, may be a little thick." I could live with that. Plus the class was oohhing, ahhing and moaning some more. To me this was a good sign.
The lentil soup tasted yummy. The bacon and croutons added a nice crunch and flavor. If this was health food I could eat it. Note I said health food not vegetarian. The soup was made with chicken stock and had bacon. My experience with most vegetarian soups is that the cooks don't bring in mushroom broth or another taste to add depth. They are flat. This soup had depth and was tasty!
The last tasting was the Manhattan clam chowder. I dove in. The broth was nice. It didn't seem like a cream soup however. I need to check the recipe, maybe it wasn't supposed to be. I bit into a clam, chewy. Someone added them too early. What a shame as there were several in there to eat.
The one student was still working on her white bean. It looked awful. I think she packed up soon after our tasting. I didn't notice if she participated in the indulgence that followed. We were allowed to take 15 minutes and eat whatever soups we wanted. I went for the minestrone. It was so good! Then had a cup of our cream of broccoli, also good. My now my salt meter was on high. I decided to see if the shrimp bisque would be good with seasoning. I put some in my bowl, added some salt and pepper and tasted. It needed a wee more salt. (I'm turning into a salt monger now. Pathetic.) Now it was good! This I could enjoy. I don't think it was top of the class, but it could earn a much improved award.
Now I need to make the lentil. This will be on our practical. I need to inquire how the croutons were made, did they have garlic, etc.
Next week, it's on to meats! YUM! Bwoop! Can't wait!
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