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Adventures in Culinary School - International
I started in Oct 2002 at the Scottsdale Culinary Institute. These are my stories.
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International
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Monday, May 19, 2003
International, Week 1 Day 1. I have been kind of dreading this class for a some time. They used to post grades of students in classes and I would see one or two A's every time. I also heard a lot of things from students saying how tough things were and how stressful things get. We'll see how it goes. Our instructor is Chef Santos Villarico and his associate is Chef John Deflieze whom we had for Charcuterie. We had hours and hours of lecture. From 3:30-10, Chef Santos told us about the rules, policies, and what to expect. At the end, he finished with the first lecture on Russia. We were finally back in the kitchen but still no cooking. This class is Saucier and Catering rolled into one. We learn about the cuisine of 20+ countries, have three knife cut tests and six platings as well as three written exams. Each day we make a dish for family meal pertaining to a particular country. Tomorrow's meal is Russian. The class is split into five groups for cleanup duties: washing pots and pans, kitchen manager duties, floors, stainless steel, and walk-in and fryers. Within our groups, there is a group leader who helps out with everyone else as well as working on miscallaneous projects for the chef like making a dish with other group leaders or making stock. I'm in group 2 with Michele (she and her husband Fran just joined our class, they were one block ahead of us but missed a block due to illness), Amor'e (she's retaking the class), Jamie, Deborah, and Gabe.
Tuesday, May 20, 2003
International, Week 1 Day 2. Russian. I got an easy dish to make eggplant caviar. Bake an eggplant, peel and chop it. Cook it with onions, garlic and tomatoes. Let the flavors meld together. Adjust the seasoning and you're done. We served it room temp, but it is usually served chilled. The key to this dish is to caramelize the onions while the eggplant is baking. It adds a hint of sweetness to the dish. Other students made blinis, chicken kiev, pojarski, salmon koulibiaca, and pirogis. When we in Basic Baking and came over to International for dinner it was a scary experience. Now the roles are reversed, I think we have a greater appreciation for the food because we know what's in it. I also think that our class is good at following directions which I believe translates to better tasting food.
Cleaning up the International kitchen is notorious. The floor is never totally clean. There's alway squibs, little particles of stuff, on the floor. I think it's because the wheel on the tables are dirty. We roll them back and forth to clean the floor underneath. I also think that people are as detail oriented as others.
We had double lecture today. We learned about Greece, Morocco, Lebanon, Spain, and Turkey before family meal and Italy after kitchen cleanup. The Mediterranean lecture was mainly about Spain. In these lectures we go over terms and they we discuss traditional and indigenous foods and factor that affect the cuisine: climate, terrain, geographical location, tradition, religion, education, and economy.
Wednesday, May 21, 2003
International, Week 1 Day 3. Plating 1 - Salad. So in this class we have six platings. We would have seven, but we have a holiday next Monday. For the plating we have an hour to duplicate the plate that the Chef demos for us. Today, Chef Santos demoed four salad plates. We didn't have to duplicate his though; just compose a salad. His platings were elegant and seemed so effortless. I guess that's why he's the Instructor. We were allowed to use anything in the walk-in except the stuff on the speed cart which was to be used for the family meal. The other restriction was that we were not allowed to use mustard or egg to emulsify our vinaigrette. I made a pear salad with a pear and sage vinaigrette and a goat cheese patty. I made the mistake of making the vinaigrette in a food processor instead of a blender so it didn't emulsify. I put too many pear slices on the plate so my portion control was off. And I hid the goat cheese which should be more highlighted because it was the most expensive item on the plate. Learning is good.
Greece, Morocco, Lebanon, Spain, Portugal, and Turkey. I was the group leader today. I helped Deborah with the tortellini filling for her dish tomorrow, Amor'e with Green Beans with Tomatoes, and Gabe with his Osso Buco also for tomorrow. I spent a lot of time making veal stock: roasting bones and cutting mirepoix. I also helped to roll out pitas for family meal. Other students made Paella, assorted tapas, spanish tortillas, hummus, tiropetes - cheese and egg rolled in phyllo dough and fried, roast leg of lamb, Brandade du Morue - patties of salt cod and potatoes, moussaka, baba ganoush, tabouleh, and quail with fruit.
Thursday, May 22, 2003
International, Week 1 Day 4. Plating 2 - Pork medallion, with tourne potatoes, medium dice carrots, haricot verts, and a port thyme sauce. I overcooked the pork, Chef wanted it medium and I was at well done. I burned the sauce and was trying to save it. I lost track of my vegetables and they were overcooked. I need more practice at juggling multiple pans at once. Instead of trying to save the suace it would have been much faster just to start over. Live and learn. There are still four more platings.
Italy. My assignment today was Pasta e faigoli, a soup of pasta and beans. I burned the beans on the first try. Luckily enough were soaked the night before to give me another chance. I also burned a little of the pancetta and mirepoix. I fished out all the little burnt pieces when I added the stock. I think I was a little thrown off my the mistakes I made during my plating. It came together in the end. Other students made chicken marsala, polenta, mushroom risotto, osso buco, tortelli, insalate di melanzane - eggplant salad, bruschetta, veal piccata, potato gnocchi, sunchoke gratin - a sunchoke aka Jerusalem artichoke looks like a knobby potato, insalata russa, and zucchini ripeni.
After cleanup, we had another double lecture of France and Germany, belgium, UK, Norway, and Sweden.
Friday, May 23, 2003
International, Week 1 Day 5. We started off with a double lecture on Japan and China. It felt very familiar.
France. My assignment today was Sweetbreads. I was supposed to work with Deborah but she was absent. A couple of other people were absent as well. Since we have Monday off, they probably took the advantage to have a four day weekend. I was excited to cook sweetbread since I've never handled them before. It was a pretty good experience. It is soaked in milk overnight to remove the undesireable flavors. I poached them in court bouillon until they were cooked. They I cooled them down and removed the membrane and veins. It was combined with hame, chicken, mirepoix, and mushrooms and then topped with puff pastry to form a crust. I didn't have to make the puff pastry as Baking did that for us. I just rolled it out. Manny helped my make and cut the chicken as well as rolling out the crust. I finish with time to spare. Other students made sausage wrapped in brioche, coq au vin, endive meuniere, soup aux moules, quiche, potage cressionaire, strawberries romanoff crepes, skate in brown butter, casoulet with duck confit, lorette potatoes.
Saturday, May 24, 2003
Weekend event: I actually sat out a Sunday event at the Ritz-Carlton called Wine, Women, and Jazz. It featured about 20 of the top women chefs in the valley. However, on Saturday I did assist Chef Gwen Walters with her dish for the event. I helped her make 130 summer rolls. It was sauteed carrots, onions, peppers, cucumbers, grilled chicken, cellophane noodles in sesame oil, and mint leaves wrapped in a rice noodle wrapper. Very good stuff.
Monday, May 26, 2003
International, Week 2 Day 1. Memorial Day, no school. Recovering from food poisoning. Not from school because no one else got sick. It's more likely from eating leftovers at home because my mom got sick as well.An interesting development surfaced. Richie left for home to get married. Apparently, he will return to be with us in Advanced Baking and finish up the last two weeks of International another time.
Tuesday, May 27, 2003
International, Week 2 Day 2. Test 1 and knife cut test 1. The test was pretty easy even though the chef didn't give a thorough review like the other instructors do. Five days worth of terms done in matching style, some true or false, and a few short answer. The knife cut test was interesting. In one hour, we have to produce 2 ounces of julienne carrots (1/8" x 1/8" x 2 - 2 1/2" matchsticks), 2 ounces of brunoise (1/8" cubes) and three tourne potatoes (seven sided football shape measuring 2" with 3/4" diameter). I got a point taken from each cut for a 7 out of 10. Not bad. The time limit for the next knife cut shrinks to 45 minutes and the last one is 30 minutes; all with the same production requirements.
Germany, Belgium, UK, Norway, and Sweden. Jamie and I made Poulet Facon Bayeux. I think it's a Belgoum dish since they're cuise is heavily influenced by the French. We roasted 12 rock cornish game hens, quartered them, topped them with royal glacage that JB and Krystal made, and browned them under the broiler. Other students made kottbullar - swedish meatballs, zweibelkuchen - onion tart, bergens fiskessuppe, shepards pie, sauerkraut with sausage, spaetzel, rotkraut, and fish and chips. Lecture was on Australia.
Wednesday, May 28, 2003
International, Week 2 Day 3. Plating 3 - NY strip with tourne potatoes, batonnet carrots, haricots vert, and rosemary Maderia sauce. What did I do wrong this time? Well, I over cooked the steak to medium well instead of medium rare, my potatoes were undercooked, my sauce was gummy, and I was late. More to improve on.Japan. Jamie and I were assigned gyoza pork dumplings. When I told Chef that my dumpling folding wasn't up to par he said my mom would be disappointed at me. I guess that should be true, but we usually buy our dumplings frozen at home. Turns out that I fold em just fine. We saved a lot of time beacause the morning class made a lot of extra stuffing. So we only had to fold and fry. Other students made Carrot Kinpira, Vegetable tempura - by the way mushrooms should never be used for tempura in my humble opinion, shumai shrimp, sukiyaki, soba noodles, bamboo rice, miso soup, daikon, sushi - maki rolls with various fillings, negimayaki - rolled beef, chicken teriyaki, sunumono - cucumber salad, and pureed corn soup. Today's lecture was on Singapore, Thailand, Mayalsia, Thailand, and Indonesia.
Thursday, May 29, 2003
International, Week 2 Day 4. Plating 4 - Fish. Ocean perch with sauteed spinach, tourne carrots, haricots vert, rissoto, and a beurre rouge (red wine butter sauce). Another struggle with the plate. My sauce broke, my rissoto was a little burnt, my fish still had some bones and scales, and I was late. I'll get it right one of these times. I think I'm starting to get used to cooking under time pressure.
China. Surprisingly, the worst food day of the three week block. I'm not sure why. The food was just not very appetizing. Deborah and I were assigned fried rice. Easy enough. But I misread the time our food was due, so I had to rush last minute with everything. I personally thought the recipe was lacking, but I followed it. We were missing ham which provides a key component to the overall flavor. My mom wanted me to bring in some Chinese sausage. That would have saved the dish, but I forgot. On the menu was lemon chicken, vegetable chop suey, chinese bbq pork, chinese cabbage, spring rolls, whole fried fish - I talked Eve into easy the eyeball and she nearly gagged, stuffed lychees, peking duck - actually turned out well, chow mein, halibut with pineapple, and stir fried taro with carrots. Lecture was on India and the Middle East.
Friday, May 30, 2003
International, Week 2 Day 5. Chef Santos started off with a lecture on Oriental foodstuffs. I actually tried a fetal chicken egg. I didn't have it raw; rather it was boiled. It tasted like chicken and egg. It's a little disturbing to take a bite and see that you've eaten the head of a developing chicken. some other things we got to sample were tamarind, fresh lychees, dragon fruit (milky white opaque flesh with tiny black seeds). We also had some thawed durian. Interestingly enough I had some fresh durian over Easter break in Pasadena. I like it a lot. I used to be afraid of trying it due to the strong odor, but I guess my palate has developed. The difference between the fresh stuff and the frozen stiff is the texture. The fresh stuff is stringier while the frozen stuff is mushy; the flavor is the same. I think I prefer fresh, but frozen is still good.
Australia. My turn to be group leader again. No one in my group really needed help. I worked on pork satay for Monday's family meal. I made the marinade with Jim and Rodney. Then I sliced and skewered the pork. On the menu today were spice chicken and lentil salad, scallops with black bean vinaigrette, yabbie salad with gazpacho sauce and potatoes anna, potato pancakes with sweetbreads, shepards pie, oysters, tazmanian salmon burger, goat cheese olive fennel tart, and roasted tomato soup.
Saturday, May 31, 2003
Weekend event: Taste of the Nation. This annual event is put on by Share Our Strength which raises money and awareness for anti-hunger programs. About 60 students helped out with the event. Top valley chefs were there with tables to serve little paltes of food to the guests. I helped out in the VIP room which was held in the Demo Kitchen. I helped Chef Christoper Gross and Michel Richard with their dishes: Braised boneless short ribs with red wine sauce, and chocolate peanut cruch bar. There were two seatings: one at 7pm and another at 9:30pm. The Chef did demos of their dish while we plated in the back and took their cue to serve to the audience. There were about 30 people at each seating. We plated the short ribs on potato mousseline, a small frise salad, and a dash of mushroom powder. I thought the mushroom powder was a great use of the gills of portabello mushrooms which are usually waste. Chef Richard's dessert was simple two small squares of chocolate peanut crunch bars on top of a coffee sauce. I didn't get a chance to wander around much because I didn't know I was allowed to. I did partake in famuly meal which was a hearty lasagna and garlic bread. Before the event, I helped out an Arizona Republic reporter with a blind tasting of supermarket hotdogs. She had four chefs: Matt Cater of Zinc's Bistro, Christopher Gross of Christopher's Fermier, Bradley Thompson of Mary Elaine's at the Phoenician, and Michel Richard of Citronelle taste test Nathan's , Ball Park, Jennie-O, Hebrew National, and one other I can't remember. The clear loser was Jennie-O. I think Nathan's was favored by a couple of chef. I grilled the hot dogs and helped to serve them. The dhefs didn't take more than one bite of each one. I haven't seen the article yet, so maybe it was scrapped.
Monday, June 02, 2003
International, Week 3 Day 1. Test 2 and knife cut test 2. A test is a test. Again I feel the advantage of my mind and the ability to retain facts about food. Knife cuts are humbling. No matter how many times I tourne a potato, it seems like a new experience every time. Maybe it's because I only tourne 5 or 6 at one session. If I had to do 200 hundred of them for a meal, it would make me better. Julienne and brunoise. It's hard for me to be consistent on such a small scale. The only thing I can do is practice. Today we made food from Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia. My assignment was Singapore noodles. It's made with chuka soba, shrimp(Jen helped peel and devein them for me), pork loin, garlic, onions, green beans, carrots(I used the class' knife cuts), bean sprouts, and spring onions. Our group leader Amor'e helped me prep a lot of the vegetable while I figeted with the pork. I sort of overcooked the noodles but it all came out in the end. Other menu items were steamed whole fish, gado gado - cooked vegetable crudite, nonya chicken and lime curry, sizzling rice soup, stir fry snake beans and cauliflower, eggplant with tofu, pork satay, crunchy stuffed tofu puffs, pad thai, and tom yum gong. Lecture was about South America.
Tuesday, June 03, 2003
International, Week 3 Day 2. Plating 5 - chicken. For this plating, we were allowed to choose our own starch, veg, and sauce. I planned out a dish with curry couscous with peas, tourne carrots and turnips, and supreme sauce. It came together well and I got a 17/20, my highest grade yet. I felt pretty good afterwards. The grades for platings actually mean a lot more to means than test grades. I wish we had platings every day.
Molly had an accident with her knife. She sliced off a little chunk off the tip of her middle finger on her left hand in the middle of the plating. I saw the little flap of skin on her knife. She stayed for a bit and then went to the doctor. She actually came back right before we put out family meal. She's got a lot of toughness and drive in her.
India and the Middle East. My assigment was Cabbage Salad, but the morning class had a bunch leftoverl Chef Santos gave me a recipe for Aash-e Aab Lee Moo, a Persian rice dish with peas, onions, and mint. Other students made vindaloo, falafel with hummus, salatat knodar, sambosic bilahm, tandoori chicken, lemon rice, mulligatawny, basal mahshi, lamb curry, and cauliflower with tahini. Lecture on Mexico to end the day.
Wednesday, June 04, 2003
International, Week 3 Day 3. Plating 6 - lamb rack. The last plating. I was up until 2am composing my plan for the plating. I decided to made a roasted lamb rack with wild mushroom polenta, carrots, beets, artichoke hearts, and simple red wine sauce. My main focus was on presentation. I made a cone of polenta, surrounded it with four chops of lamb on puddles of sauce. For the vegetables I used a melon baller to make spheres of beet and carrots. I slice them in half and made balls of half carrot and half beet. I put this on top of a quartered artichoke heart and put one of these vegetable setups in between each lamb chop. But course there were still mistakes. My carrots were undercooked, I burned the bones of the lamb rack and my sauce was starting to break. But my lamb was at the perfect doneness and I got a 17/20. Very please with room for improvement. I think I'm gettin there. I just wish there were more platings.
South America. My dish was Peas Portuguese. An interseting dish of peas cooked with onions, and served with chicken, ham, and bacon on the edge. To finished the dish, eight eggs are cracked on top of the peas and cooked until they are set. I was a tad late since I misjudges how loing it would take for the eggs to set. Chef Santos finsihed the dish in the broiler. Other items on the menu were Ceviche, Crab empanadas, chancho adobado, halibut escabeche, poblano mashed potatoes, calamari rice, black bean soup, bean and asparagus salad, and rice pudding. Lecture was about North America.
Thursday, June 05, 2003
International, Week 3 Day 4. We presented our country reports today. I pretty much finished at the last moment. We didn't have to speak if we didn't want to, but it counted towards our class participation grades. I thought some people dragged out a bit too long. But when I went up to do my report on Italy, I would up taking the most time. There were fellow classmates signalling me to wrap it up when I was only halfway done. I didn't really prepare for the oral presentation I was just talking using my paper as a guide. I thought I could zoom through all 20 regions of Italy 30 seconds at a time. Apparently talking about the Northern regions took longer than I anticipated. I felt bad about boring the class to death; maybe next time I'll try to practice beforehand. About a third of the class presented their papers. I felt it was a good opportunity to practice talking in front of people. Although as the class representative I do talk in front of the class on a weekly basis.
Mexico. The most popular day of food. Probably because we are familiar with the flavors and know what we are looking for in terms of taste. Jamie and I made Chile Rellenos. Jamie roasted the aneheim chiles while I sliced the pepperjack and gathered the rest of the ingredients. We also decided to make a sauce, so Jamie made a spicy salsa that we added to a bechamel base that Kinsey made. We were rushing at the end to batter and fry the chiles because we needed about twice the amount of batter that the recipoe provided us. I discovered that I have the ability to whip egg whites very fast. A good thing to know. But we got our food out in time. After cleanup, we had a test review. Chef Santos basically ready off questions from two old final exams. I felt pretty good about the material.
Friday, June 06, 2003
International, Week 3 Day 5. Test 3 and knife cut test 3 and market basket. I ran through the test in about half an hour. I guess I could have scrutinized it more, but I felt like starting my knife cuts. I practiced before class with the tournes, but I just couldn't get them right for the test. Maybe there was a little test anxiety. We did have a thirty minute time limit. My julienne and brunoise were a bit big as well. Today being the last day, we got to cook whatever we wanted. I started prepping for a beef stir-fry, but Michele and Fran also wanted to do a stir fry, so I switched to grilled flank steak and Dauphinois potatoes instead. It came out pretty well. I threw together the Dauphinoise potatoes from what I remember from how Chef Rosenberg did it from the Wine dinner in March. It came out all right I think. Joe liked it which means a lot because I value his palate. After cleanup, Chef Santos gave us a farewell speech. He told an inspiring story about a woman who attempted to swim 26 miles to the shores of San Francisco from some island. The woman gave up a quarter mile from the shore. In a news conference she lamented, "If I could only have seen the shore." Chef Santos said that our future is cloudy sometimes because our vision is impaired by self-doubt or some other force. We must persevere because the stars are within our reach.
Saturday, June 07, 2003
Weekend event: ACF Junior Team tryouts. This is the second time I'm trying out for the team. I feel a little bit wiser now having gone through International. I know what Chef Santos is looking for in terms of knife cuts and platings. I feel ready. The reason that we're having tryouts is that half the team stopped coming to practice. They had practice every Saturday. Apparently they were only doing knife cuts and people wanted to do more cooking. I'm okay with just knife cuts because I know I don't practice them enough.So I made the team, but it seems like just the beginning. The first competition is in October, when I start my externship. I think I'll stay in the area for my externship because of this. There's going to be a lot of knife cut practicing over the next six months. I think that'll be good. I needed a compelling reason to work on my knife skills.
The tryouts was pretty neat. There was a pretty low turnout, so I had an even better chance. I'm not sure why the spirit in this school has died. I think it's due to the weather. I think it'll pick up again in the fall. We had to five knife cuts in 30 mintues and then we had to make a plate in an hour. It was just like International only a tad harder. Our protein was chicken, so I just sauteed the breast and finished it in the oven. For the starch I made risotto. I made some spinach, batonnet carrots, and fennel for the vegetable. The sauce was just a plain old veloute. I could have improved on the sauce and the presentation, but I was in a bit of a rush at the end. The chicken and the risotto were cooked well. So were the vegetables I think.
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