Chef Pro II: Week 7: American Regional, North and East

Pennsylvania, Vermont, Ohio, Maine, Massachusetts, Illinois, Virginia, New Jersey, Delaware, New York, Maryland and New Hampshire were the states we studied in Week 7. Lots of seafood with clambakes, lobster rolls, she crab soup, crab cakes, the Pennsylvania Dutch and Amish influence, the Italian, Irish, Jewish, and other ethnic influences, maple from Vermont, cranberries, blueberries, apples, potatoes, beans and corn. Johnny cakes, corn cakes, baked beans, and Ben and Jerry's ice cream are all associated with this region. I did my presentation on Connecticut. As many of the other New England states there is a big emphasis on fresh seafood, particularly...

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Chef Pro II: Week 6: International, Mediterranean

We had very interesting presentations on Greece (Eric), Lebanon (Jessica), Israel, (Patti)Spain (Stephanie), Morocco (Kristin), Southern Italy (Lisa), Egypt (Callie), Southern France (Tela) and I did my presentation on Northern Italy. Northern Italy is made of of 8 regions and each region has its own specialties influenced by bordering countries. The region I was most familiar with is Emilia-Romagna with Ravenna, Parma, Modena, Bologna, and Rimini. I recognized two things right away--Reggio Emilia students came to the cooking school last fall and were at a Texas Chefs Association meeting where we sampled balsamic vinegar from Modena and some...

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Student Supper Club: February 13, 2009

A few of us had been meeting at our homes outside of class and mentioned it to Chef Kurima. She suggested opening it up to all the Chef Pro II and Pastry Pro I students. That sounded fine to me and the others so we planned to try meeting every other month at the school and alternating months at our homes. We have already met at my house, Lisa Wright's and Ray Burhart's and I am hosting the March meeting. Our first official "Student Supper Club" meeting was on February 13, 2009. Chef Kurima sent an invitation out to all the students and has started a Facebook group for the culinary school with announcements. The theme was Mardi Gras and everyone...

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Chef Pro II: Week 5: International Cuisine, Asia

Asian food is hard to cover in a few hours. So many countries, so many foods. We had reports on Eastern China, known for stinky tofu, congee and red cooking, Vietnam, with its French, Chinese, and Indian influences, Southern India, which unlike Northern India, does not focus on spicy foods. Japan, China, Singapore, Korea, Thailand, and Indonesia were also presented. We discussed the common elements among the Asian countries which include unusual spices and herbs which are not only used to season foods but thought to have medicinal purposes. Current research is confirming the health benefits of ingredients used in Asian foods--ginger, cumin,...

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Chef Pro II: Week 4: International Cuisine, Europe

We are studying countries around the world, starting with Europe. Students drew names of countries at the beginning of the semester. For Europe I had Austria. I have actually been to Austria, once as a child while traveling from Germany to Italy. The mountain roads were scary to us as children and I recall my parents mentioning my brother getting sick in Innsbrook, Austria from the winding roads. I was also in Austria in 2005, passing through on the way to Germany from Switzerland. We stopped at a huge rest stop that looked more like a shopping mall with a giant food court. Very fancy. Although I didn't eat in Austria I ate plenty in Germany,...

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Chef Pro II: Lab hours: Sunday Brunch

This was the second lab I completed for Chef Pro II. We have to complete 28 hours in either event preparation or working during a Sunday brunch event. Sunday brunches are open to the public and include an omelet station, soup, salad, an entree prepared by the students and desserts.The cost is $16.18 for adults and $6.44 for children.I started out the day very impressively by cutting my finger when attempting to cut an onion in half. It was a superficial cut but embarrasing nonetheless. I was assigned to prepare one of the soups, a lasagna soup. Someone had already browned Italian sausage and I chopped up onions, carrots, gathered up other ingredients,...

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