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.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Serving Class, Espresso Training
Today we learned how to make proper espresso (not expresso!!!!), beyond merely producing the proper crema, a thin layer of foam that is produced during the brewing process. There were specific guidelines on how quickly it should brew, how long it takes to brew, what's left in the cup afterwards, etc. Everyone got to practice making at least two cups.
If you do the math that means at a minimum there were two shots of espresso, which our instructor says is the equivalent of four Italian-sized shots, per student. As with the law of averages, some students drank less than the average and some more. This made for an interesting mix of personalities.
Also during the class we set up a new POS (point of sale) system for for the café, called Café Rouge. Our class is the largest in the history of the college, so we had more people than necessary to help unpack, plug in and program the new system. While some were diligently and productively assisting with the POS, the rest were left idle.
I'm not sure if it was the caffeine or the never before provided free time to chat, but this was a class of gossip.
"She sure did take to her new authority- nit picky!"
"How is she going to pass the practical? Basic knife skills are lacking."
"Oh yeah! The chef doesn't like him!"
"Did you see her just pat him on the butt?"
"Yeah! They have to be hookin' up! What a dog! He's getting ready
to be a baby mama with someone else's baby!"
Later in the class we got to see the menu we'll be serving on Thursday. It sounds tastier than the menu I ate last quarter as an invited student. It's a lot of food too, particularly for lunch. There's a soup, a salad, a choice of four different sandwiches, a choice of three sides, and a dessert. Plus unlimited (obviously to a point) espresso drinks. All that for $12, unless you are an invited guest of a culinary student. I'd eat there all the time if I worked near campus. That's a deal! I'd get fat though so I guess it's okay being the server.
I also found out I'll be entering a state competition for servers. I will soon start training. Should be interesting!
Gotta go! Time to read about braised meats!
If you do the math that means at a minimum there were two shots of espresso, which our instructor says is the equivalent of four Italian-sized shots, per student. As with the law of averages, some students drank less than the average and some more. This made for an interesting mix of personalities.
Also during the class we set up a new POS (point of sale) system for for the café, called Café Rouge. Our class is the largest in the history of the college, so we had more people than necessary to help unpack, plug in and program the new system. While some were diligently and productively assisting with the POS, the rest were left idle.
I'm not sure if it was the caffeine or the never before provided free time to chat, but this was a class of gossip.
"She sure did take to her new authority- nit picky!"
"How is she going to pass the practical? Basic knife skills are lacking."
"Oh yeah! The chef doesn't like him!"
"Did you see her just pat him on the butt?"
"Yeah! They have to be hookin' up! What a dog! He's getting ready
to be a baby mama with someone else's baby!"
Later in the class we got to see the menu we'll be serving on Thursday. It sounds tastier than the menu I ate last quarter as an invited student. It's a lot of food too, particularly for lunch. There's a soup, a salad, a choice of four different sandwiches, a choice of three sides, and a dessert. Plus unlimited (obviously to a point) espresso drinks. All that for $12, unless you are an invited guest of a culinary student. I'd eat there all the time if I worked near campus. That's a deal! I'd get fat though so I guess it's okay being the server.
I also found out I'll be entering a state competition for servers. I will soon start training. Should be interesting!
Gotta go! Time to read about braised meats!
Monday, February 1, 2010
Skills, Vegetable Day
Today we only cooked vegetables, in various ways. Here's a listing of what was ultimately produced:
- fried eggplant
- grilled eggplant
- grilled zucchini
- sauteed mushrooms, button and baby bellas
- sauteed garlic spinach
- brussels sprouts in brown butter
- roasted parsnips
- roasted turnips
- roasted rutabagas
- roasted butternut squash
- braised cabbage
- leek timbale
- carrot timbale
- julienne yellow squash and zucchini
- sauteed asparagus
- pureed cauliflower
What was the objective of this exercise? Partially to prove that people would like some items they thought they wouldn't if prepared in a more tasty manner (translation: doused in butter). Also to illustrate that a vegetable plate could look appetizing as opposed to a pile of steamed vegetables on a pile of rice. It looked appetizing, but I'm not sure it was particularly organized.
What did I learn from this exercise? Eggplant isn't so bad; I still don't prefer sweet vegetables like butternut squash and cooked carrots. I don't like rutabagas. Turnips aren't so bad. Cooked cabbage is disgusting, even with apples. The rest I already liked and continue to like.
It was an uneventful day. Wednesday we're supposed to grill steaks. That should be more exciting.
- fried eggplant
- grilled eggplant
- grilled zucchini
- sauteed mushrooms, button and baby bellas
- sauteed garlic spinach
- brussels sprouts in brown butter
- roasted parsnips
- roasted turnips
- roasted rutabagas
- roasted butternut squash
- braised cabbage
- leek timbale
- carrot timbale
- julienne yellow squash and zucchini
- sauteed asparagus
- pureed cauliflower
What was the objective of this exercise? Partially to prove that people would like some items they thought they wouldn't if prepared in a more tasty manner (translation: doused in butter). Also to illustrate that a vegetable plate could look appetizing as opposed to a pile of steamed vegetables on a pile of rice. It looked appetizing, but I'm not sure it was particularly organized.
What did I learn from this exercise? Eggplant isn't so bad; I still don't prefer sweet vegetables like butternut squash and cooked carrots. I don't like rutabagas. Turnips aren't so bad. Cooked cabbage is disgusting, even with apples. The rest I already liked and continue to like.
It was an uneventful day. Wednesday we're supposed to grill steaks. That should be more exciting.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Knife Skills, Cream Soups
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!
Monday, January 25, 2010
Knife Skills Continues, After Knife Skills Even Better!
Today we made consommé. It's relatively easy, but looks kind of gross at points. First, I mixed ground meat with egg whites and chopped up mirepoix. This is similar to making a meatloaf, but there are lots more eggs whites than with meatloaf so it was much souper, otherwise similar.
Then we started cooking it up on the stove. It looked like someone had puked into my stock pot (sorry gross I know, but that's what it looked like). There were all kinds bits and pieces of food floating around the top of the pot. ICK! Slowly that turned into a big burger floating on top of the broth, called the raft. If I were Ratatouille, the cartoon rat, I'd probably like to float on a big burger. I guess that's a fitting name.
I tasted the raft. It tasted like bland meatloaf. It was better with salt. Still I think Ratatouille would be okay with it.
I got some good praises for my dicing skills used in the garnish. Unfortunately I didn't blanche the pieces long enough. I also got kudos for seasoning my consommé well. My strategy is working. Season the salt to taste, then add more.
Compared to other classes, this one seemed less eventful. Maybe that means we're settling into the routine of the kitchen.
After class however was really cool! The class after ours fabricated a pig and we were invited to participate. First the class broke each half into its five primal parts. There was a big bone saw involved. I didn't get to run it, but it still seemed exciting. I noted the chef/saw runner didn't wear goggles. Somehow I think that's a no no.
Then we broke apart each of the five primals (ten total because there were five on each half) into the various meats, tenderloin, ham, picnic, shoulder, spare ribs, etc. There was a lot of meat there, but I was told only about 5 to 10% would go to waste. Someone offered me the spinal cord. I declined. I guess the waste just went up to 6%.
Then we started cooking it up on the stove. It looked like someone had puked into my stock pot (sorry gross I know, but that's what it looked like). There were all kinds bits and pieces of food floating around the top of the pot. ICK! Slowly that turned into a big burger floating on top of the broth, called the raft. If I were Ratatouille, the cartoon rat, I'd probably like to float on a big burger. I guess that's a fitting name.
I tasted the raft. It tasted like bland meatloaf. It was better with salt. Still I think Ratatouille would be okay with it.
I got some good praises for my dicing skills used in the garnish. Unfortunately I didn't blanche the pieces long enough. I also got kudos for seasoning my consommé well. My strategy is working. Season the salt to taste, then add more.
Compared to other classes, this one seemed less eventful. Maybe that means we're settling into the routine of the kitchen.
After class however was really cool! The class after ours fabricated a pig and we were invited to participate. First the class broke each half into its five primal parts. There was a big bone saw involved. I didn't get to run it, but it still seemed exciting. I noted the chef/saw runner didn't wear goggles. Somehow I think that's a no no.
Then we broke apart each of the five primals (ten total because there were five on each half) into the various meats, tenderloin, ham, picnic, shoulder, spare ribs, etc. There was a lot of meat there, but I was told only about 5 to 10% would go to waste. Someone offered me the spinal cord. I declined. I guess the waste just went up to 6%.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Hollandaise Sauce, Oh My What Work!
This morning I made Eggs Benedict for my mother-in-law's birthday. I thought the sauce was relatively easy to make in class so I figured, no problem. Right? WRONG!
I planned ahead and brought a strainer so I could easily remove any of those eggy pieces that might get from the sides; what else could go wrong?
I shopped for all the ingredients and brought them with me, English muffins, a pound of butter (yes, 12 of the 16 ounces are needed for four egg yolks according to the recipe), multiple eggs for the Hollandaise and for poaching, Canadian bacon and some spinach. The dish doesn't traditionally have spinach, but I thought the dish needed color and vitamins. Plus I planned to serve it to three young nieces/nephews and children always need vitamins.
(I just realized typing this that Eggs Benedict is an international dish... English Muffins, Canadian bacon, Hollandaise sauce. Ha! Ha! Some lame humor on my part.)
I wanted to engage the children in the cooking process. Thus I told them the first step is to get your aprons on; I stated this like a Nascar race, "Aprons On!"
Next we organized and got all our ingredients and equipment together, or in culinary language prepared the "mise en place" literally translated as "settings in place." I pulled out my whisk.
"What's that?"
"A whisk"
"What's a wisssk?" Adorable, aren't they? "I want a wisssk of my own."
"A whisk is used to fluff the yellow part of the egg and make the sauce. I don't have another whisk, but here, put this in your apron pocket." I handed them each a spoon. Thankfully they each seemed satisfied.
Next we proceeded to get out the eggs, muffins, and bacon. Oops. Someone ate half the muffins I brought since they were placed on the counter the previous night. No problem, there were two more packages that happened to already be in the household. I opened them and discovered that each muffin was completely covered in green mold. I guess throwing out deteriorating food goes by the wayside when you have kids because they weren't just spotted with mold, they were coated with fuzz and there wasn't just one half-eaten package of them, but two. No problem, there was some bread that wasn't fuzz colored.
On with breakfast... we needed to separate the eggs. Each child wanted to crack an egg. Easy enough, they cracked and I separated.
Snag two arrived. Uncle Joey went out to purchase hula hoops because my neice wanted to win the hula hoop contest at school the next month. Of course she'd need to practice. Conveniently, she remembered seeing hula hoops for sale at the CVS. Only the errand took nearly an hour because she remembered incorrectly and Uncle Joey had to drive the opposite direction to Walmart instead.
While holding breakfast preparations my neice and nephew proceeded to wear the bowls on their heads, toss the muffin pieces in the air to practice flipping, name and label each one of the eggs. Of those that I can remember, my neice named her eggs Delinda, Anna, Allie, Alex, and Crystal and my nephew named his Nicko, Dicko, William, and Maui. He wanted to name one Sicko, but I told him that was an ugly name. Dicko is a derivative of Richard so I felt that was an acceptable name.
Simultaneously, I started my vinegar reduction. With the flying muffins and equipment I managed to burn the reduction twice. Luckily this isn't difficult to redo.
Also to keep them engaged, I had them mix the eggs whites even though these would be tossed into the trash. This lasted quite a while; I was pleasantly surprised. But it didn't last long enough. Soon both of my apprentices were elsewhere never to return, particularly once the hula hoops arrived. My shortlived days as an influential aunt recruiting for Future Chefs of America ended.
On with breakfast, the actual cooking part... I started my first batch of Hollandaise sauce. All seemed to progress well. I thickened and whipped my yolks and incorporated my vinegar reduction. I incorporated the melted butter slowly at first and my sauce was progressing well, a little thick, but it looked good and was a nice color. In class we thinned the sauce with water, so I also did this.
BLAM! My sauce broke! No need to panic; I had eggs and butter I'd start over. This time I started with a little more vinegar reduction. My yolks whipped up better than the first time. Alright! One false start isn't bad, all in the learning experience. Plus as I told my husband, the screaming children and added stress of starting over was good stress practice for the approaching practical.
I started adding my butter, a little at a time, not too fast. Progressing well.... progressing well... more butter... incorporating well... more butter...
BLAM! My sauce broke again! Now I was getting nervous. I was running out of eggs and butter. I also had to make a new batch of vinegar reduction (this is #5 I think
). I took it slowly. I told myself not to fear using lots of the reduction in the yolks as this seemed to work well last time.
My yolks were looking really good this time, nice and frothy, no egg scramble on the sides of the bowl. Hot dog! I'm cookin' now!! Finally! I managed to incorporate all the butter!
I tasted my sauce. Holy crap! It was salty!! Normally I'd use unsalted butter, but Target wanted to charge nearly twice as much for it so I purchased salted butter. I think all the salt had settled to the bottom of my melted butter dish and as a result I'd used super concentrated salted butter for my third batch of Hollandaise sauce. I didn't have the ingredients, nor time to make a fourth batch. Maybe it would be okay when eaten with unsalted eggs and spinach.
Finally I served up the Eggs Benedict! All in all, it was okay. No one could cut through the muffins because they were super toasted on the bottom awaiting my second and third batches of sauce, but at least the salty sauce wasn't as bad as it was by itself.
Something tells me I need more practice.
I planned ahead and brought a strainer so I could easily remove any of those eggy pieces that might get from the sides; what else could go wrong?
I shopped for all the ingredients and brought them with me, English muffins, a pound of butter (yes, 12 of the 16 ounces are needed for four egg yolks according to the recipe), multiple eggs for the Hollandaise and for poaching, Canadian bacon and some spinach. The dish doesn't traditionally have spinach, but I thought the dish needed color and vitamins. Plus I planned to serve it to three young nieces/nephews and children always need vitamins.
(I just realized typing this that Eggs Benedict is an international dish... English Muffins, Canadian bacon, Hollandaise sauce. Ha! Ha! Some lame humor on my part.)
I wanted to engage the children in the cooking process. Thus I told them the first step is to get your aprons on; I stated this like a Nascar race, "Aprons On!"
Next we organized and got all our ingredients and equipment together, or in culinary language prepared the "mise en place" literally translated as "settings in place." I pulled out my whisk.
"What's that?"
"A whisk"
"What's a wisssk?" Adorable, aren't they? "I want a wisssk of my own."
"A whisk is used to fluff the yellow part of the egg and make the sauce. I don't have another whisk, but here, put this in your apron pocket." I handed them each a spoon. Thankfully they each seemed satisfied.
Next we proceeded to get out the eggs, muffins, and bacon. Oops. Someone ate half the muffins I brought since they were placed on the counter the previous night. No problem, there were two more packages that happened to already be in the household. I opened them and discovered that each muffin was completely covered in green mold. I guess throwing out deteriorating food goes by the wayside when you have kids because they weren't just spotted with mold, they were coated with fuzz and there wasn't just one half-eaten package of them, but two. No problem, there was some bread that wasn't fuzz colored.
On with breakfast... we needed to separate the eggs. Each child wanted to crack an egg. Easy enough, they cracked and I separated.
Snag two arrived. Uncle Joey went out to purchase hula hoops because my neice wanted to win the hula hoop contest at school the next month. Of course she'd need to practice. Conveniently, she remembered seeing hula hoops for sale at the CVS. Only the errand took nearly an hour because she remembered incorrectly and Uncle Joey had to drive the opposite direction to Walmart instead.
While holding breakfast preparations my neice and nephew proceeded to wear the bowls on their heads, toss the muffin pieces in the air to practice flipping, name and label each one of the eggs. Of those that I can remember, my neice named her eggs Delinda, Anna, Allie, Alex, and Crystal and my nephew named his Nicko, Dicko, William, and Maui. He wanted to name one Sicko, but I told him that was an ugly name. Dicko is a derivative of Richard so I felt that was an acceptable name.
Simultaneously, I started my vinegar reduction. With the flying muffins and equipment I managed to burn the reduction twice. Luckily this isn't difficult to redo.
Also to keep them engaged, I had them mix the eggs whites even though these would be tossed into the trash. This lasted quite a while; I was pleasantly surprised. But it didn't last long enough. Soon both of my apprentices were elsewhere never to return, particularly once the hula hoops arrived. My shortlived days as an influential aunt recruiting for Future Chefs of America ended.
On with breakfast, the actual cooking part... I started my first batch of Hollandaise sauce. All seemed to progress well. I thickened and whipped my yolks and incorporated my vinegar reduction. I incorporated the melted butter slowly at first and my sauce was progressing well, a little thick, but it looked good and was a nice color. In class we thinned the sauce with water, so I also did this.
BLAM! My sauce broke! No need to panic; I had eggs and butter I'd start over. This time I started with a little more vinegar reduction. My yolks whipped up better than the first time. Alright! One false start isn't bad, all in the learning experience. Plus as I told my husband, the screaming children and added stress of starting over was good stress practice for the approaching practical.
I started adding my butter, a little at a time, not too fast. Progressing well.... progressing well... more butter... incorporating well... more butter...
BLAM! My sauce broke again! Now I was getting nervous. I was running out of eggs and butter. I also had to make a new batch of vinegar reduction (this is #5 I think
). I took it slowly. I told myself not to fear using lots of the reduction in the yolks as this seemed to work well last time.My yolks were looking really good this time, nice and frothy, no egg scramble on the sides of the bowl. Hot dog! I'm cookin' now!! Finally! I managed to incorporate all the butter!
I tasted my sauce. Holy crap! It was salty!! Normally I'd use unsalted butter, but Target wanted to charge nearly twice as much for it so I purchased salted butter. I think all the salt had settled to the bottom of my melted butter dish and as a result I'd used super concentrated salted butter for my third batch of Hollandaise sauce. I didn't have the ingredients, nor time to make a fourth batch. Maybe it would be okay when eaten with unsalted eggs and spinach.
Finally I served up the Eggs Benedict! All in all, it was okay. No one could cut through the muffins because they were super toasted on the bottom awaiting my second and third batches of sauce, but at least the salty sauce wasn't as bad as it was by itself.
Something tells me I need more practice.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Knife Skills Day Five, Sauces
Today we made the mother sauces, espagnole, tomato, velouté, béchamel, and hollandaise. (Wow, I didn't think I could remember all those from merely hearing them in lecture, but after making them and knowing which teams made what, I actually can name them all. See... experience does matter.) My team made espagnole and tomato and each student had to make his own hollandaise.
I told my husband I had to make eggs benedict over the weekend and got a big "Alright!" He may get surprised with some asparagus or steak too with hollandaise. Something tells me he won't mind.
The sauces generally weren't difficult. I did learn that when you think you've sweat the onions enough, or carmelized the carrots enough... you didn't. When you think you added enough oil, you'll receive an "add more" from the chef. I'm guessing this is true too with salt, but I have yet to experience it firsthand. From appearances across the classroom, the other sauces were also completed without difficulty.
The hollandaise sauce I thought would be a different story. Rather, everyone was able to make theirs without breaking it, meaning the fats/oil would separate from the egg or the eggs get to hot and scramble instead of making a nice smooth sauce. There was one example of a broken sauce, made on purpose so we'd know what it looked like.
At the end everyone had to label their bowl and the were all compared at the end. I noted one bowl was not the original bowl in which the sauce was made. Thus there were no crusty pieces on the sides or other references to the actual process of making the sauce, just the finished product in a nice and clean bowl. "Who's is that? That's sneaky!" Of course if was our class leader's (same guy who had the nice tournés) and he got a shout out from the chef for cleaning up his presentation. Not fair! I asked before putting mine out if I should strain it and got a "don't worry about it." Obviously, I should have worried about it, especially since mine got used as the example of high sides of dried egg.
Next class sounds busy too. We're making several soups and consommé. I can't wait to see the raft that forms on top of the consommé with all the impurities! After learning this was sometimes used as family meal for peasants I felt bad for all the "Eeww that's for dinner tonight, Mom?" inquiries through the years. I suppose fast food beef could be equated to the contents of the raft however, meat bits, some protein additives, flavoring, sounds like a Whopper to me. Grill up the raft and put it on a bun! (Please don't! That's NOT Dalliscious!)
I told my husband I had to make eggs benedict over the weekend and got a big "Alright!" He may get surprised with some asparagus or steak too with hollandaise. Something tells me he won't mind.
The sauces generally weren't difficult. I did learn that when you think you've sweat the onions enough, or carmelized the carrots enough... you didn't. When you think you added enough oil, you'll receive an "add more" from the chef. I'm guessing this is true too with salt, but I have yet to experience it firsthand. From appearances across the classroom, the other sauces were also completed without difficulty.
The hollandaise sauce I thought would be a different story. Rather, everyone was able to make theirs without breaking it, meaning the fats/oil would separate from the egg or the eggs get to hot and scramble instead of making a nice smooth sauce. There was one example of a broken sauce, made on purpose so we'd know what it looked like.
At the end everyone had to label their bowl and the were all compared at the end. I noted one bowl was not the original bowl in which the sauce was made. Thus there were no crusty pieces on the sides or other references to the actual process of making the sauce, just the finished product in a nice and clean bowl. "Who's is that? That's sneaky!" Of course if was our class leader's (same guy who had the nice tournés) and he got a shout out from the chef for cleaning up his presentation. Not fair! I asked before putting mine out if I should strain it and got a "don't worry about it." Obviously, I should have worried about it, especially since mine got used as the example of high sides of dried egg.
Next class sounds busy too. We're making several soups and consommé. I can't wait to see the raft that forms on top of the consommé with all the impurities! After learning this was sometimes used as family meal for peasants I felt bad for all the "Eeww that's for dinner tonight, Mom?" inquiries through the years. I suppose fast food beef could be equated to the contents of the raft however, meat bits, some protein additives, flavoring, sounds like a Whopper to me. Grill up the raft and put it on a bun! (Please don't! That's NOT Dalliscious!)
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