As Chef S often likes to do while lecturing on the topic of the day, he gave us a bit of a history lesson and talked about soup’s inauspicious and long-term status as nothing more than food for the peasant masses. It wasn’t until the early 1800s when Antonin Careme (according to the chef, one of the old farts that gave us classical [...]
Posts from ‘May, 2009’
Week 4, Day 1. Puff Pastry
Puff pastry is a delectable, yet fussy thing to prepare. Preparing a really good puff pastry dough amounts to adhering to and religiously following a few very basic, yet very important techniques. As with pate brisee, the list of ingredients that you’ll need in order to make a basic puff pastry dough is not extensive [...]
The Great Souffle Experiment
Both Chef D and Chef S have repeatedly stressed the importance of practicing the various techniques learned in class when we’re in our home kitchens. In a major departure from the way I have ever thought of ‘homework’, I’ve really been looking forward to having a chance to hone some of these techniques (and also [...]
Week 3, Day 2. Souffles
Souffle. Just the mere mention of this word can be enough to make an aspiring chef question his desire to continue along his new chosen path to culinary enlightenment. Souffles have a notorious reputation for being incredibly fussy…just thinking about evil thoughts while in the presence of a baking souffle can be enough to prevent it from ever rising. [...]
Week 3, Day 1. Pate Brisee
Pate Brisee is a French term that translates to ‘short paste’. It can also be referred to as ‘broken paste’. You and I and the other folks in the room will know it as your basic pie crust dough. Not to be confused with the American interpretation of pie crust dough, in class we focused on the [...]
New Page – School Diary
Not the most exciting post, I know, but I just wanted to let everyone know that I created a separate page where all of my culinary school diary posts will live. You can access the page by clicking on this link, or you may notice that there is now an additional “School Diary” page navigation [...]
Week 2, Day 2. Eggs
Note: I apologize for the length of this post. I typed this while sitting in the middle seat during a 6 hour transcontinental flight while heading to SF for a quick weekend trip. I was bored, the drone of the jet engines was no competition for the freight-train like noises emanating from the giant that [...]
Week 2, Day 1. Pate a Choux
For our baking lab on Monday we tackled pate a choux, a versatile, forgiving, and fairly sturdy (yet exceptionally sticky) dough that can be used to make all sorts of things like eclairs, cream puffs, profiteroles, and beignets. Pate a choux in French basically means ‘cabbage paste’. I’m not exactly sure why the French coined [...]
Week 1, Day 2. Part 2. Cooking w/ Vegetables
One of the graduation requirements for my program is that all students must submit a portfolio of their work. Because of this requirement, it is strongly suggested that students bring a camera to class. I forgot to do that on Day 1, but not on Day 2, so here are a few snapshots from Wednesday’s [...]
Week 1, Day 2. Part 1. Intro
Uh, hey See Dan Cook, didn’t you already write a post called Intro? Yes I did, but that was an intro to my Monday Baking Lab. You see, yesterday I had the first of my Wednesday Food Basics labs which are led by a different chef instructor. A new lab series with a new instructor is enough cause [...]
