Week 7: On Fire!

Saturday was our last class of Mod 1 – we are supposed to know by now sanitation, meat fabrication, stocks, and sauces. I say suppose because everything right now seems a blur, if you gave me a chicken to fabricate it would take me a while, I would turn it this and that way, and eventually get it done, but I still have a long way to go.

The Chef reminded us what would happen on Sunday: final written exam, final practical exam, bring 2 potatoes medium diced, 2 shallots minced, 1 head of garlic minced and parsley minced. An essay on sautéing (done!) all of our recipes typed (done!) and our notes also typed (done), in a nice folder. I was ready, I had typed and printed everything since Thursday. However the Chef decided to ask one of the girls to show us her folder so we could see what he was expecting. Ok this was not a simple folder; this was a binder, with every single page in a sheet protector, dividers, and labels, what the hell??? I hate overachievers; of course I started to panic, mine would look like crap compare to this. So I did say to the Chef: what is your expectation? A folder? A binder? And of course he answered: you give me the best you can do, this will be a reflection of how much you want this and how much you care. Right in the gut! So yes I went to staples got a binder, and sheet protectors – which did make sense for the recipes- and. …That’s it. I included my notes – which had pictures by the way!- and put the essay in a separate – nice- folder!.  I really was not in the best of moods.

Sunday came and I was ready, I had studied my sauces, and was ready to make mayonnaise, medium dice potatoes and prepare broccoli soup. As usual (and not because I am a genius) I finished the written test pretty quickly and went straight into the kitchen to do my work. It was great to have the kitchen for myself; I could work at my pace and not get distracted, this didn’t last long, 20 minutes after others started coming in. I presented my food and got great reviews from the Chef, gave him my binder and my homework. According to him I started in Venezuela with my potatoes, he said I was in Cuba now, I was getting there but still had to practice more, I swear I can’t do a straight cut!

And just like that we were in Mod 2. New Chef, new pace, new methods. The Chef came in very quietly provided her expectations, gave us her background (she had worked in many high ranked restaurants and at Pixar studios running the cafeteria!) and started the class. Finally we were going to do some “real” cooking:  chicken and beef sauté with a pan sauce. The first Chef had taught us to chop in the middle of the cutting board, this new Chef wanted us to chop in the corner of the board so you could angle your knife at a straight angle and get better cuts ja! Who knew? Chef 1 did not believe in rushing, he wanted us to take our time and make our food perfect; Chef 2 gave us specific time windows.  We were asked to chop potatoes by using her method, of course I was taking my time, and then I heard “who am I waiting for to show me their potatoes? Oh just you? (Looking at me) you have 1 minute to finish, and she smiled. – aaaaaah! Talk about embracing change!

After the Chef finished explaining and demoing she wanted each of us to sauté 3 chicken breasts and 3 flank stakes and present the one that we considered the best, in an hour and 15 minutes jajajaja was she kidding me???? Thank God she realized it was too much and said just one chicken and one steak each. Any way it was madness, some of my classmates could no figure out that the recipe was just for reference and you should follow your instincts, for me that meant not doing my entire mise-en-place in little containers and labeled. I started doing my chicken and steak; I have to admit I am good at seasoning, so I knew I had this. Little did I know, my sauces burned, flame was too high and I left the pan too long on the stove, of course whose kitchen had big flames twice – mine! I had to do the sauces all over again, while my chicken and steak were resting and getting cold. I was supposed to check the temp on the steak, 145 for medium rare, I was so rushed that I went with my gut and touching the meat. Suddenly I heard you all have 3 minutes to present, what????? I ran like a chicken without a head, got the plates, mine were missing so I stole from another pile, burned my hand, pour my sauces in each plate, sliced my chicken, sliced my beef ( the wrong way! – let me explain: flank steak is a great cut of meat, however it has this lines, and you have to cut it against the lines, if you don’t the meat will be very chewy, if you cut it right it is very very tender – I have known this for a long time, I have cooked it before many times- anyway at that point there was nothing I could do. She liked my chicken – although I used to much butter so it was almost fried instead of sautéed- my sauce was good but was missing a tiny bit of salt – I hadn’t even had time to try it – steak had a good sear but was a bit rare in the middle – again I did not use the thermometer I couldn’t find in my big bag! – The sauce was very good but it could’ve been reduced a bit more, and of course the meat was cut the wrong way.  Agh! What a day, what a difference, we were going into this headfirst. At the end of the class one of the girls couldn’t find her side towels, and started crying! Like a baby! I totally understood she was just overwhelmed and tired, but there is no crying in baseball so….

So is a new Mod, a new Chef, and a new way of working, no fear! – Like Julia Child said. And as always I can’t wait until next Saturday. 

Week 6: Whisk and whisk and whisk

This weekend was all about sauces, the mother sauces, the grandma sauces, the cousin sauces, and all of them with lots and lots of butter. Since I am always on a diet I had forgotten what real butter tasted like, I swear I could've taken a straw and just drank it straight up from the pot.

I was doing great until we started doing the hot emulsions meaning: hollandaise, béarnaise and crème anglaise. 

The trick to a good emulsion moreover a hot one, is in the speed of the whisking, which translates at least to me on how fit you are. The chef demonstrated the hollandaise and the béarnaise, and all I kept thinking about was eggs Benedict and steak yummy. Anyway the sauce needs to be whisked very fast in a bowl on top of a pot of hot but not boiling water. If the water is too hot the eggs will cook and you will end up with scrambled eggs. The chef whisked liked he was a transformer, his hand was a blur, the eggs raised beautifully and the hollandaise was done. Now it was our turn, we all got into position like we were going into a wrestling match. Pot of hot water check, bowl with egg yolks check, whisk in hand check. Like I said the eggs are supposed to rise, and form "ribbons", when you get that consistency you can add, very slowly, the clarified butter. I started whisking like my life depended on it, again those words: faster, faster. Suddenly the eggs started to rise, I had no feeling in my wrist, arm, head, but it what is happening, at one point I was whisking so fast that half the sauce ended up in my jacket, but damn it that sauce was going to be right. And it was! I was so proud of myself, some of my class mates had to do it 3 times because it was simply not happening for them, and I got the first time! But, lets not get ahead of ourselves it's not like I am ready to enter a cooking competition, I either just got lucky or I am the terminator! Jag!

We also did tomatillo salsa, corn relish, mango chutney and roasted tomato coulis. And as a bonus crème anglaise (which was to die for, in that I would have happily drowned)

So module 1 is almost over, according to the school I have learned culinary fundamentals, meat fabrication, basic sauces, and on Saturday basic soups. My final written test and my practical will be Sunday, for the practical I have to medium dice 2 potatoes, make mayonnaise, and broccoli soup. Wish me luck! And on to module 2: hot cooking techniques! And my homework for the first day an essay on sauté - say again?

But as always I can't wait until next Saturday.

Week 5: Crunchify!

This weekend was a lot of fun but also exhausting. It all started with the volunteering at the Food Network’s Wine and Food Festival Burger Bash. I arrived at the location at the scheduled time ready to go, however that day was very cold, I had checked the address and it was close to the water on Pier 36 on a place called Basketball city, so I had assumed it was indoors. Well, it wasn’t. The volunteer director assigned me a “very big job”, which was standing next to the freezer truck and making sure that from now on and during the event all the meat boxes that came in out of the truck were properly labeled with the restaurant’s name. You had to be kidding me! I knew that volunteering meant doing whatever I was told to do, but this was inhumane. My knees were shaking my hands were turning purple (like the joke in Spanish: no siento ni las paticas, ni las alitas, ni el piquito). So after 45 minutes, I thought what the hell I am going to talk to the coordinator. I told her : “Hi, listen I am not complaining, but you didn’t give me heads up that it was outdoors, and unfortunately I am not dressed properly to spend the night next to a freezer truck with this weather, and I cannot allow myself to get sick I have class this weekend so…” Thank god she immediately spoke with the director, I was a culinary student and I was supposed to be helping a chef, not guarding the truck. So the director came by with 2 young girls that were dressed worse than me, and said to them “I have a very big job for you, Anabella hand them the sharpie” I felt so bad for them, but oh well. He then asked to change into my uniform, and report to Bobby Flay’s booth. Bobby Flay! Yes!!!!.http://bobbyflay.com/

It was so cold, that I left my sweat pants on, put on my chefs pants, left my shirt under the jacket, and headed to Booby’s Burger Palace’s booth. I introduced myself, met the guys and was ready to work. They asked me to wear a BBP T-shirt, so I asked for a large and wore it on top of my jacket, hence I look like a piñata in the picture, but at least I wasn’t that cold. I was asked to put together the plates and napkins, which was basically impossible with all the wind, did I mentioned the wind??? I then was put at the end of the “assembly line” for the burgers. My job was to “crunchify” the burgers. Let me explain. I had to take 5 to 6 chips, make a little tower, take the top bun, and put a stick in the middle. Seems easy right? .No. When we did the first run through, the head chef said: Anabella that is wrong! Wrong! ( in my head I was laughing because I felt I was in an episode of hell’s kitchen), and seriously I had no idea how it was supposed to be done, so more power to me for trying. So according to him, I had to take the top bun with my left hand pick the chips with my right put them on the bun, hold the chips with my thumb, put them on top of the burger like “pillowwwws”  and then put the stick through the middle with my right hand, the burger needed to have height. I can assure you performing surgery is easier. This “method” is Bobby Flay’s signature thing –adding the tower of chips- you can add it to any of his burgers and it’s called to crunchify.  If you want to learn more about the art of crunchifying visit: http://www.bobbysburgerpalace.com/index.php

 The VIP’s started to arrive around 6:30, and the pace was fine, I had time to put “the pilowwwws” perfectly. But then the chef warned us “prepare yourselves for this, we are going to have tons of people coming at us at the same time, and we need to stay on top of the game, we need to win, are we ready to crunchifyyyy!!!????” Yes Chef! I cannot explain the amount of people that showed up at the same time, just imagine that Bobby’s had 2000 beef patties. So my plan of going around trying burgers, taking pictures and meeting chefs went immediately out the window! Still shaking because of the cold, I started assembling burgers like there was no tomorrow, to hell with the “pillowwwws” we had to do it fast. The last time I had heard faster, faster was during a spinning class in 1995. Once in a while I recognized a voice and put my head up: oh! There’s Rachel Ray, oh! There’s Alex Guarnaschelli , Kathy Griffin, Alain Ducasse! I did meet Bobby Flay, but we only exchanged hello and thank you. Finally at 10, the event came to an end; I hadn’t had water, peed or eaten since 3 p.m. At the end I asked to try a burger, which was delicious – goat cheese, honey mustard, watercress, crunchifieeeed- the guys were in shock that I hadn’t eaten anything, but I was fine, I smelled like a grill – since I kept standing next to it to get warm-, tired, but super excited, . We said our goodbyes and the most rewarding part was when they gave me their cards and said to me: “You did an awesome job, if you ever need a job, a reference or whatever please call us”. That made everything worth it!

Class this weekend was good, we finally made all the stocks possible, I think I did well on my test, and had my assignment typed and printed ready to be handed in. We did had to butcher a leg of lamb, and I basically channeled “Dexter” and chopped away, I made a big mess, and apparently I didn’t “follow the boooone” which is what our Chef tells us every time. At least I didn’t cut myself.  We also learned to make, roux, and beurre marie, which are thickening agents, and of course we chopped and chopped like crazy.

Next week we finally get to make the mother sauces: Béchamel, Espagnole, Hollandaise, Velouté and Tomato Sauce. I can’t wait until next Saturday.

 

 

Week 4: A break with the stars

As I had mentioned in my previous post we had a break this weekend and I didn’t have class, however I got the chance to volunteer for the Star Chefs International Congress. I was a bit nervous about doing this, I hadn’t volunteered in anything since high school, I had no clue what was expected of me, what would I be doing or how would it work, all I knew is that I would be helping in the culinary area, I should bring my uniform and not my knives (Thank god – cutting my finger in public was not going to happen after all).

The congress was held in the Armory in Park Ave, that place is really big and perfect for an event of this magnitude,  after I changed I was taken to the main stage to watch the final round of the pastry competition. The chefs were presenting a show piece, a dessert and a cocktail, and the only thing I could think off was please don’t let the pieces fall (although secretly wanting them to fall…jijij), after they presented they asked us to start moving the carts out of the way but then thought better about it and told us to leave it alone.  That gave me the chance to walk around the place and get some samples, a delicious pistachio crusted lamb with goat cheese polenta, a blue fin tuna sashimi, jamón de bellotas (acorn-fed ham), Peruvian ceviche, passion fruit gummies and chocolate bonbons.  Just being able to try all those dishes was worth the work. 

Walking around I started feeling like I was at Disney World when I caught a glance of Richard Blaise ( All Stars Top Chef Winner) Paul Qui ( Top Chef winner Texas) and Patricia Yeo ( Top Chef Masters contestant), it was like finding Mickey and Minnie, I had to take a picture. To be hones I felt embarrassed, but what the hell it was now or never, so up to Richard and Paul I went, asked them if they would take a picture with me and the said yes, so that was my rock star moment .

I then reported to my station – a pastry workshop – little did I know that I would be assisting Angela Pinkerton the head pastry chef for Eleven Madison Park! Eleven Madison Park is the best restaurant in USA – I have had the chance to be there once and it is a spectacular experience- so imagine my excitement.  Of course there was a chef from the school who was in charge, then a recent graduate and then me, which was totally fine by me I didn’t know even where to start. I was given the task to find all the equipment she needed for her demo, bowls, scrapers, forks, containers, etc.  Which meant running around all the backstage kitchens and trying to find it, everybody was scrambling and everybody wanted the exact same amount of bowls, so….I resorted to checking all the carts of all the workshops and started taking one by one…my Chef told me do what you have to do and I did.

Angela was great, she prepared a malted dessert, and taught the attendees how to make a pretzel cookie- thin as paper. She was very humble and very nice to us assistants.

So my day ended in high note, I loved working there, and I am eagerly waiting if I get chosen to volunteer at the Food and Wine NYC Festival. Will keep you posted. I can’t wait for this Saturday.

Week 3: Bloody Murder!

This weekend was great, and I know the question in everybody’s mind…no, I didn’t cut myself yes! But believe me there was plenty of blood.

We started on Saturday chopping, chopping: onion, celery, carrots – all of these vegetables were going to be used to make stocks. Then we moved on to the exciting and terrifying part of the day: fileting fish. All I could think of was, this is where it’s going to happen this is when I’m going to lose a finger…but I stayed positive and thought of Julia Child “be fearless”. We started with a flat fish: the fish that is obviously flat and has both eyes in one side (ewwww).  Then we moved on to round fish – the regular ones we all know and eat, it wasn’t as hard as I thought, however taking the guts out is a little disgusting and since the fish were super fresh, there was a quite a bit of blood to go around – there goes one of my jackets for sure-. We fileted salmon and rubbed it with a certain mix of dried herbs and put it in the fridge to macerate overnight, apparently we would be enjoying cured salmon (lox) next day for breakfast. We did shellfish, clams and oysters (I almost stabbed my hand again with this one).

Then, after cleaning our cutting boards for the millionth time, the Chef brought a big white box, covered, and told us to get ready. He uncovered the box, and there they were 8 perfect lobsters alive and kicking, it was time to commit murder. The chef told us that we didn’t have to do it if we didn’t want to, that whoever felt uncomfortable could leave the kitchen and then come back, however he strongly recommended we did it at least one time. I was ready to go but in my head I kept singing “Under the sea, under the sea…” what the hell is wrong with me? Any way I took the lobster, that little Sebastian was moving a lot, put in my board, took the knife (kept on singing in my head), and got into position and with the help of the Chef I stabbed it in the middle of the eyes and down. I would be lying if I told you I didn’t scream, oh god the sound was horrible, and guess what? They keep moving and jumping around after you kill them and take the head off, even in the hot water!!!.  And no, we didn’t get to eat them; we were getting them ready for another class, so we didn’t enjoy them with delicious melted butter. Damn it.

We also made shrimp butter, you would ask, and what is it? Basically the best thing ever, it tastes exactly like having a piece of lobster with butter, you can use it too cook fish, shrimp, for a sauce, etc.  

Sunday started with straining our fish stock, and having some of the lox for breakfast, it was really really good.  And then out came the animals again! This time we would “fabricate” chicken, duck and beef. Bring it on! This was a bit harder; I don’t know why I kept hitting the bones with my knife all the time, by the third chicken I was getting better. The duck guts were also disgusting; however Fois Gras is and will remain on of the most delicious gifts from heaven.  We learned how to tie a roast like they do at the butchers which was pretty cool. We got to cook our medium diced potatoes “persillade” style – finally the fruit of our labor.

By the end of the day I was exhausted, but the Chef had asked who could help him for an hour, and me wanting to gain points with him, said I would do it. I HAD TO CHOP 3 BOXES OF TOMATOES !!!! It took me and another class mate 1 hour and 45 minutes nonstop. Next time I will really think about “helping out”. But as always I can’t wait until next Saturday (actually we don’t have class next weekend but I will be volunteering at the Star Chefs International Congress - www.starchefs.com/cook/events/icc/2012 – God help me).