Skills- Steaks, Roasts and Birds

Today we learned dry cooking methods. We roasted a chicken, made pan gravy for it, roasted a duck, made a citrus sauce for it, roasted a standing rib roast, made au jus for it, and each grilled our own NY strip steak.

Each student had to string and trussed our chicken before putting it in the oven. This was not a difficult task and everyone seemed to be able to complete it without much difficulty. By the end however the poor chicken looked like it'd been tossed on the floor and run through the dish machine. The ends of the legs where the string first wrapped was all red and purple like a black eye. Then when preparing the chicken for the oven, it got a complete oil rub down. Maybe the massage helped ease the throbbing some. The duck made out much better.

Nearly everyone overcooked his steak. Some were well seasoned, others not so much. I believe that the grill should have been hotter. Our steaks were ghetto thin so in an attempt to get the appropriate grill marks the first students to grill ended up with well done steaks. A few had a hint of pink. Later students had steaks that were more acceptable for service.

We were told that a steak cooked to the proper temperature with poor grill marks would get us a better grade than an improperly cooked steak with great grill marks. We also learned how to break down our roasted chicken and plate it. This too would be a portion of our practical grade.

We also grilled chicken halves, breast and leg. These were much harder to hatch with grill marks and many of us forgot to start with the display side down first (start with skin side down). There was also a wider variation of doneness. One unfortuate student dropped his on the floor taking it off the grill.

Good thing it wasn't the practical or that'd be an automatic F. A student can turn something in for a grade on how the dish looks and is presented, but 50% of the grade is on taste and the chef won't taste a bird that's been on the floor. Rumor is historically the highest grade given is an 85. No one gets an A. One student said she'd never gotten a C before in her entire academic history. My advice to her... get ready to get one.

There were few veggies today. We did taste some artichoke hearts we marinated earlier in the week. They were tasty. I need to try the technique that we used with lemon water and herbs. The hearts that come marinated in the can are not as tasty as these were-- not surprising. Plus the food processors are not as diligent as we were in getting out all the pieces of choke.