Week 14: Chef Pro II Final

After a quick written exam (25 questions) I was anxious to get into the kitchen and see what was in the "mystery basket", actually a mystery "tray". I drew the #1 and found the matching tray in the walk-in refrigerator. It had the following items: pork ribs, a beef steak, a chicken leg, shrimp, pork, fingerling potatoes, grits, cabbage, asparagus, snow peas, celery root, buckwheat honey and a mango I didn't feel too anxious about the items except for the celery root, something I've never cooked with. I decided on the following dishes (after looking around at what other things were available in the walk-in and pantry). Chicken spring roll with snow peas, cabbage, scallions, ginger and garlic with a sweet and spicy sauce (apricot preserves, soy, stock, ginger, garlic reduced). I also decided to cook the celery root, puree it and combine it with potatoes to serve alongside the beef with a chimichurri sauce. In the meantime, as I was writing down what I planned to make I did not see that there was a big case with a lot of fresh herbs, fresh fruit and other things we could use. I would have chosen some other preparations had I known, but I still was able to grab some herbs and fruit. I got off to a slow start by worrying too much about what I was going to do with all the items. We were told that students in the other class made 9 or 10 items. It was an hour into the 3 and 1/2 hour time period we had and I had not even plated 1 dish. I had problems with the chicken spring rolls because the deep fryer was the wrong temperature. I looked at the guage and thought it said 350, but it was really at 300.
By the time I figured out what was wrong I had to start over and make more spring rolls.
Although they turned out great I was chastized for making something "in my comfort zone".
So does that mean if someone who grew up on American food cooked a piece of meat in sauce they would be cooking in their comfort zone? Yes, I'm comfortable with Asian food, but I was also trying to find a use for snow peas and cabbage and that seemed a good way to use those items. After finally getting that dish presented it was 4:45 and I had until 7:00 to make everything else, at least 4 dishes but I wanted to make 5 or 6 more. I tackled the beef next but found it was freezer burnt and smelled bad. I lost a few minutes looking for Chef Kurima to get a new piece and that seemed to throw me off track as well. I did manage to make a nicely cooked steak with chimichurri sauce made of parsley, garlic, wine vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper.
My celery root and potato puree formed a base for the steak and sauce. It tasted good to me but did not have enough of the celery root flavor for the Chef. While I was making all the other dishes I had made a spicy Korean marinade for the pork ribs and planned to serve them with mango salsa. They were roasting in the convection oven very nicely next to a pan of fingerling potatoes I was roasting with olive oil. I worked on a dish with the pork coated in a herb crust, served with the fingerling potatoes and some sauteed asparagus with lemon. The pork was tender and juicy but the herb crust fell off in some parts when I sliced it. The asparagus was cooked nicely but a little to lemony and the potatoes were underseasoned. I presented the pork rib with the mango salsa next. The rib and sauce looked great together on the plate was tasted wonderful to me--salty, savory, spicy with the sweet sauce. Chef Kurima thought the salsa could use a little more heat. My last dish was shrimp and grits. Time was running out and it was 6:30 when I started making it. I threw together the grits quickly and then seasoned the shrimp, seared it, made a nice creamy spicy sauce like the one I made after watching a Bobby Flay Throwdown and plated it a couple minutes before my time ran out. It looked a little plain on the plate--2 creamy things, not enough contrast, but it was delicious in my opinion and I enjoyed eating a few bites of it at the end. I was so relieved to be done I couldn't stop smiling.
Overall I did just fine and even if I "only" had 5 dishes, 2 had 3 or more components and people who did 7-9 dishes could have made tasting type dishes with 2 components so I didn't feel too bad about what I made. I do not like these mystery basket challenges at all or the timed, rushed, stressed feeling that goes along with it. I know this will not be how I cook in the future, but I understand how it is a useful teaching tool. It has really pushed me to remember how to put food together without having to look at a recipe and gotten me out of the habit of relying on recipes. I also feel a lot more confident about plating food and how it should look on the plate.
I now own a big set of plain white plates and try to make some type of sauce with every meal even if it's just to practice sauce ideas.
Today for Sunday breakfast I'm making Vanilla French toast with my own caramel sauce, apples cooked in brown sugar and butter with toasted walnuts and whipped cream.
I have a week off before I start Pastry Pro I on May 6 but it will be a busy week as I am making all the food for a luncheon for 30-40 people at work. Tonight I will be representing the Culinary School at the Big Taste of Fort Worth at the Hilton Hotel along with my good friend Lisa Wright. We will be sitting at a booth giving out cookies from a cookie waterfall and telling anyone who is interested about the school. Now I'm having fun....
Halfway through Culinary School and I'm ready to use what I've learned. I have been asked to judge a chili contest at Saginaw High School on May 5 and I will help Chef Paula Ambrose with a big dinner for the grand opening of the Azle Library in late June.

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Week 13: Food Production and Service

From the lecture on Food Production and Service I was reminded of all the reasons I never wanted to be in the restaurant business--staffing, suppliers, and keeping track of profit/loss.
My parents owned restaurants in California when I was a teen. Their first restaurant was Mr. Ed's Coffee Shop, a franchise. It was open 24 hours a day and served breakfast anytime. The menu consisted of breakfast dishes, sandwiches and burgers, and some "hot plates". The best item they had was the char grilled burgers. Char grilling was new in 1972 so their juicy, grilled burgers with special sauces were very popular. I never worked the grill but happily learned how to be a waitress for them. I wore a funky white zipped up nylon dress with an apron and the ugliest shoes you've ever seen, made a lot of tips, and hated the smell of maple syrup and grease in my hair after a day of work. I got tired of men telling me to "put your finger in my coffee to sweeten it up" and of the people who acted so superior. I recall my parents complaining about business problems all the time--employees quitting with no notice, food "walking out the back door", and prices always going up. The restaurant business did not sound like fun to me. So I left to join the Air Force and see the world. Now years later I have actually contemplated having my own restaurant. We'll see about that.
We had to learn about table settings and did a rather lame exercise in which we presented a virtual meal to Chef Kurima at the place setting we put together. I think it was a waste of time but at least it was easy. She had some other surprises in store for us later. To get us ready for finals next week she conducted a "rapid fire" appetizer drill. We had to make an appetizer in 20 minutes using items we had earlier "mised" along with anything in the par stock and our "secret ingredient". Some of us got onions, some eggs. I got onion.
Someone had defrosted shrimp so I thought I'd make my shrimp hushpuppies. The time sped by and I had no time to prepare a sauce, however they tasted pretty good. We all sampled one another's dishes and there was a good variety--some good, some a little strange. Deep fried puff pastry is not so good. We then had 20 minutes to make an appetizer using the other item--egg for me. I had cooked some sushi rice earlier so I made tamago yaki (egg cooked in layers and rolled) It suffered from a lack of pizzaz but at least it looked decent--not easy in 20 minutes.
I thought we were done but she threw in a final drill--make an appetizer in 10 minutes. I threw together a tortilla cooked with egg, onion, ham, and cheese. It was forgettable. But, on the positive side, I know I can put some food together fast! Hope I can do this for the final next week, but with better food. I'm not as nervous as I was for the first semester since I know I can do it now.

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Week 12: Seafood

I was really looking forward to the seafood class because I really like cooking with seafood for health reasons and taste. I thought I would prepare well for this class now that I know how the routine works. We were told we would have to make 5 or 6 dishes with the available seafood so I thought I would prepare by practicing some dishes at home and having a good idea of how to make them prior to class. I've wised up a bit over the 26 classes so I now can actually think on my feet without being recipe-dependent, although I still find it hard to remember all the ingredients in dishes without referring to a recipe, but I'm getting much better. The week before class I drove my husband crazy making seafood. One night I made Shrimp Etoufee, Shrimp Victoria, Oyster Tostadas, and Shrimp Hushpuppies. I made several versions of Shrimp Hushpuppies until he couldn't eat another one. I made homemade mayonnaise for aioli and wanted to make Shrimp and Grits but ran out of time during the work week. I thought about seafood recipes all week long, going over the ingredients in mind during the boring meetings at work. All my dishes were good, except the Shrimp Victoria--I didn't like the sauce. Once I perfected the Shrimp Hushpuppies we all loved them. I had Lobster Hushpuppies at the Lonesome Dove restaurant a while back--$12.00 for 3 or 4 little hushpuppies, so I thought this would be a great dish. I planned to plate it with a corn relish and some of my aoili.

Class started with an excellent lecture by Chef Loy on the basics of seafood, including market forms, inspection, and storage as well as the various types of fish and cooking methods. He demonstrated filleting a whole salmon as well. We "mised" as a group, a good way to be ahead of the game--chopping onions, mincing aromatics, cooking rice and pasta, etc. We then had less than 2 hours to prepare at least 5 dishes using scallops, mussels, clams, oysters, salmon, grouper, crap, squid, and flounder. We also had to make at least 1 dish with lobster. I felt frantic when I looked at the clock--7:30 and heard the last dish had to be presented by 9:20. I made the following dishes:

Shrimp Etoufee
Oyster Tostadas with Andouille Cream Sauce, Spinach Salad, and Aioili

Salmon with Citrus Salad

Seared Flounder with Tarragon, Parsley, Citrus Gremolata

Lobster Salad on Field Greens

My Shrimp Etoufee was awful. I had made some at home using the same ingredients and it was wonderful! Seriously good so I don't know what happened--too much worchestershire sauce and just off tasting. My roux was not developed enough--although the recipe I tested called for a light roux--Chef Sively insisted the roux had to be dark. The Oyster Tostadas were stacked mini corn tortillas with fried oysters, Andouille Cream Sauce and salad in between layers was OK, too heavy on the aioli and the tortillas not crisp enough but tasty and nice looking. I felt good about this dish overall since it was so complex. I made the aioli (homemade mayo) by hand and it was really good. My oysters turned out great and I had to learn to shuck them myself, although Lisa Wright helped out a lot!

The Salmon with Citrus Salad was almost a disaster. I seared the salmon in clarified butter then added some garlic. The butter was so hot it burned the garlic. Yikes! I quickly picked out the burned garlic but a few specks were left so it looked over-peppered. However, the salmon tasted pretty good and my Citrus Salad was good--too much grapefruit but still had a good taste.

Time was speeding by and I had only done 2 dishes. I waited in line for 15 minutes, no exaggeration, for my first dish to be checked so I didn't start on dish 2 until 8:20, so 1 hour left to make 4 dishes. I wanted to make my Shrimp Hushpuppies but I couldn't locate any cornmeal. (Which wasted several precious minutes while I searched) I started throwing stuff together like a maniac so I could finish on time. I seared the flounder, added some stock, parsley, tarragon, lemon zest and salt and pepper, with some asparagus. The fish and sauce tasted good but the plating was very dull--just a flat piece of fish sitting on the plate with some asparagus. I had intended to make some couscous but not enough time was left. I still had to make something with the lobster so I made a lobster salad with tarragon and put it on some greens I dressed with a quickly made lemon vinaigrette.

It was another "OK" dish but lack something. I was just relieved I made all 5 dishes! I figure I spent at least 30-35 minutes waiting in line so I was able to make the dishes in 1 1/2 hours.

Not too bad!

Shrimp Hushpuppies

1 1/2 cups cornmeal

2 T all purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp kosher salt

1 egg yolk

1 cup buttermilk

2 egg whites

8 oz chopped shrimp

2 T minced scallions

2 T minced parsley

1 T minced jalapeno pepper

2 T chopped cooked bacon

Mix dry ingredients, add all other ingredients except egg whites. Whip egg whites to soft peaks, then fold into cornmeal mixture. Deep fry in 350 degree oil. Drain on paper towels.

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Week 11: Healthy Cookiing

Now healthy cooking is a topic I can relate to. I have been trying to practice healthly cooking for many years, that is until I started Culinary School and started using butter and cream and frying things in a deep fryer! I have a huge collection of cookbooks from Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, Super Natural Cooking to the Passionate Vegetarian. I even subscribe to The Vegetarian Times magazine. I would much rather make simple, good tasting dishes with small amounts of meat, fish, or poultry or substitute tofu or beans for the meat. My favorite convenience foods are Amy's Organic frozen dinners--all vegetarian with no preservatives or chemicals. It was so refreshing to hear about the healthy cooking techniques such as steaming, poaching, roasting, cooking with little fat. Since fat is a flavor carrier and enhancer the use of generous amounts of oil and butter is what makes the food taste so good to us, particularly when we eat out since we don't really see what goes into the food. I have seen the amount of clarified butter we use and it's not pretty! Also, drizzling olive oil on the food after it's finished is also recommended. I remember a conversation I had with my mother a few years ago. She would watch Food Network during her dialysis treatments and she was horrified at the practice of "pouring" olive oil on top of cooked food. Being Japanese she used very little oil to cook food (except for the occasional treat of tempura). I don't remember her using butter on bread and she always used the smallest amount of oil possible to saute or cook anything. I still prefer eating that way whenever possible.

Healthy cooking is emphasized more today than ever--after all the baby boomers like me are all getting old! We are dealing with weight gain, cholesterol, diabetes, heart disease, and lack of activity while the food industry tempts us with food choices we can't resist. Ever notice how huge the portions are in a restaurant? Portion control is one of the most important components of healthy eating but probably the most ignored factor when we eat out.

We discussed the history and types of vegetariansim: vegan, ovo-vegetarian (eats eggs), lacto-vegetarian (eats dairy), Lacto-ovo vegetarian (eats eggs and dairy) and fruitarian. We heard about the various non-meat protein sources such as beans and soy products and learned about the various soy products: tofu, soymilk, TVP (textured vegetable protein), tempeh (fermented soybeans), and miso. I have eaten all of these products and like most of them, especially tofu.

Our assignment for the evening was intended to help us learn to work faster, be creative, and cook some healthy food. Chef Kurima would write a start time, end time, and type of dish on the board. The first assignment was "healthy appetizer". Of course my mind went completely blank even though I've made dozens of healthy appetizers. This is where being recipe-dependent is a big disadvantage. No recipes so just use your own imagination and experience. Why is that so hard? I'll tell you why--but only a menopausal woman would understand. Anyway, I was able to put together a bruschetta with brushed with garlic and rosemary infused olive oil, sauteed mushrooms and feta cheese. Not bad. Next assignment: Ovo-lacto entree. I know lots of things to make with eggs and cheese but in 20 minutes--now that's hard. I felt like I was on the show "Chopped". I made an omelet with spinach, goat cheese and sun-dried tomatoes with some garlic pepper potatoes. It was OK but a little heavy on the sun-dried tomatoes. My next assignment, vegan entree, was pretty successful. I used tofu, edamame, garlic, ginger, mushrooms, carrots, onions, bell peppers, lemon juice, soy sauce and made a fried rice dish. It was actually very tasty and my favorite dish of the evening. The next assignment, vegan breakfast, was also a good one. I used soyrizo (very tasty), onions, garlic, chopped tomatoes, cilantro, brown rice, and sauteed it in a small amount of oil, seasoned it with salt & pepper. I softened corn tortillas and put the filling inside, browned the outside of the tacos in a little oil and served the tacos with some pico de gallo. I really enjoyed the flavors of that dish and will make it for my family. We then had a "your choice" dish using some type of tofu. I wanted to make edamame hummus, something I've eaten but never made so I thought I could incorporate silken tofu into the edamame. I processed the edamame, tofu, garlic, lemon juice and made the hummus. It was actually pretty tasty. I served it with corn tortilla chips (not too healthy since I fried them).

The last dish was another healthy appetizer. I made a brown rice, egg, and cheese dish shaped into rounds but got it the the chefs 3 minutes late so I didn't get credit for it. Oh well, all in all it was a lot of fun and I didn't feel so bad. I felt very good about the food I made without recipes, using ingredients I saw in front of me, no pre-planning and managed to make them taste really good.

My brown rice and tofu recipe:

Cooked brown rice (2 cups)

To make the best brown rice use the same method you use for pasta--lots of water, salt, but cook it until it's done all the way, then drain in a colander. Try it--it works great.

tofu--1 cup small diced firm tofu

edamame--1/4 cup cooked shelled edamame

mushrooms--1/3 cup sliced

onions--1/4 c diced

red bell peppers--2 T diced

carrots--1/4 cup small diced

1 tsp minced garlic

1 tsp minced ginger

soy sauce to taste

salt & pepper to taste

tsp of sweet/hot chili sauce

Brown tofu in small amount of olive oil, set aside. Saute all vegetables in small amount of olive oil, add brown rice, tofu and soy sauce. Cook until vegetables are tender but not overdone.

Serve with sprinkle of lemon zest and some sweet chili sauce.

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Fredericksburg Culinary Arts: Thai Treasures

I guess I can't just relax on vacation. I looked for a cooking class in Fredericksburg for the weekend we would be there and found the Thai Treasures class taught by Carol Seminara and Joe Houde at the Fischer & Wieser's Das Peach Haus. The class was small, only six people, and a special guest who sat in--Mark Wieser. The Fischer & Wieser Raspberry Chipotle Sauce is one of the well known products that made them very famous ten years ago, however their story goes way back. Mark Wieser set up a small log cabin on their property in 1969 where he sold his family's jams and jellies on the roadside. His mother told him the log cabin was a waste of money but their jams and jellies are sold all over the world now and they have a large factory in Fredericksburg.

Back to the class--Carol and Joe were delightful. They moved from Los Angeles to Fredericksburg in 2004 and purchased a bed and breakfast, now called "The Cottages at Limestone on Main". Carol previously worked as a free lance food stylist for the TV and motion picture industry and Joe was a graphic designer for the movies. Each morning, Carol and Joe prepare--from scratch--a gourmet, four-course breakfast and deliver it to the guests on a silver tray. I was fascinated by their story and their bed and breakfast, particularly since the one we were staying at was not so great. It could have used a good cleaning and was kind of depressing.

The class was packed with recipes including Tom Yum Gung (Shrimp and Lemongrass Soup), Grilled Beef Salad, Pad Thai, Thai Green Curry Chicken, and Coconut Sticky Rice with Mangoes. I have cooked some Thai food such as Thai Basil Chicken, Pad Thai, Pad Woon Sen, and Thai Fried Rice, however I really wanted to learn to make good curry. I was pleased to learn they would be making their own green curry paste with fresh ingredients. I have never been fond of the already prepared kind. Carol toasted coriander seeds, cumin seeds, black peppercorns and ground them all, added cilantro leaves, stems, and roots, sea salt, pepper, lemongrass, garlic, scallions, galangal, lime zest, green chiles and fish sauce. This sauce was flavorful, spicy, intense and layered with so many tastes. Combining it with the coconut milk, zucchini, red peppers and chicken resulted in the best Thai curry I've ever eaten. I don't think the restaurants make their own curry paste after I've eaten it fresh. I will be making this curry paste soon. I also enjoyed the other dishes and seeing all the fresh ingredients they used. Everything was prepared with attention to all details. I really wanted to stay at their bed and breakfast the last night we were in Fredericksburg and asked them if there was a vacancy. Fortunately there was and we left our other B & B and moved to theirs the next day. This was a wise move because we got to visit with Carol and Joe, see their organic herb and flower gardens, and she even gave me a container of her curry paste to take home. I can't wait to go back for another visit and another cooking class.

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