So I got asked if my duck was spam. Um, no. Although I can see from the photo how it might be mistaken for spam, seeing as how perfectly it was cooked, rested and sliced. Well, I'm going to tell myself that instead of it being understandable because there's still fat under the skin. Also seen, which was really disturbing: leather hotpants with sheer pantyhose. Really? I mean, c'mon, be considerate of people's eyes even if you are a fashion victim and don't care how you look! Those shorts would have been short on my 4 year old niece. And given the cold weather, I've seen far too many (super) short skirts and cankles. You may wonder what cankles are - they are, apparently, when the leg fails to taper from the calf to the ankle and makes the abrupt transition from calf to ankle - hence the name. I didn't use to notice them much until someone mentioned them the other day. Suddenly it seems I see an awful lot of them. Or perhaps I'm just obsessed with legs since I started going to ballet again.
A confession
I've been having chocolate cravings, which is highly unusual. If my parents read that last sentence, I'm sure they're going to wonder if they wandered onto the wrong blog. Anyway - the danger of having food ingredients around and doing Patisserie is that you have - yes, you guessed it - chocolate! The other night was disgusting enough when I ate the white chocolate straight out of the bowl, but tonight has been even more classy - eating my dark couverture chocolate chips by the handful. Mind you, these are the ones we have to temper for truffles so I could always try to convince you it's all about quality control, but really, who are we fooling?
Sleeping in
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| Preparing for the last practical - and having a Croque Cordon Bleu at the Cafe |
Queue de lotte poele, encornets farci avec risotto avec langoustines et coriandre - Pan fried monkfish tail, squid stuffed with langoustine and coriander risotto)
Tonight was our last practical class. Ever. So off I toddled, clean uniform and portfolio in my bag, ready to take on the stupid monkfish. I am not a fan of monkfish - the fish itself is nice - white, kind of firm, not fishy at all. But skinning the thing - ugh - it has a layer of slimy skin that comes off easily but underneath it is a layer of silver skin that you also have to take off. If you don't take it off, it either turns gray or makes the fish curl up. Or both. There's a way that you can kind of skin off the silver skin the way you take the skin off a fillet of fish, but it still leaves bits and pieces on. Not to mention, if you accidentally cut through the silver skin on the fillet like I did on my first fillet, you have to do it the long and annoying way.FYI, coriander and cilantro are the same thing, just different languages (I forget which is what). We didn't have coriander so I ended up chopping up some dill for the risotto - it could probably have used a bit more dill but still tasted pretty good.
So it was supposed to be a fast and easy practical except the monkfish's silver skin was annoying me. Then we had to brunoise some carrot, celery and onion. Which is fine except I didn't think the celery through and I got a very nice, fine julienne which I then couldn't use for my brunoise - which I needed for my risotto. Finally got a good risotto! It was a little dry looking on the plate but apparently it tasted good and it was cooked the way chef wanted it. A little too much flour on my monkfish and squid (I patted it off, I did!) but the sauce was good - langoustine-y, saffron-y and buttery (but my sauce split at the end because my plate was too hot). I got a very encouraging comment - Chef JB told me to cook like this during the exam and I would be fine.
It was also a fun time because no one was taking it seriously. There was a lot of laughing as we made fun of each other and some of the students who usually don't talk ended up participating as they channeled different chefs from the school.
After class...
My classmates and I went to the pub in the courtyard after class. Knowing that I wasn't going home soon and that the food wouldn't be nice later, I gave it to one of the guys at the front desk. By the time I got home, it was too late to buy groceries at Waitrose so I went to Tesco instead. It's true what they say about not doing grocery shopping when you're hungry - I caught myself looking at things I normally wouldn't - Doritos and Pringles especially. Managed to stifle those urges but I ended up buying a packet of mac 'n cheese, then some baby salad leaves, baby beetroots and tomatoes to make a salad with goat's cheese I had in the fridge. Only thing is, I got home and remembered that I still had 2-minute ramen noodles in the cupboard which have to be eaten before I leave London. Well 2-minute noodles aren't that nutritious and I really wanted some vegetables. Luckily I had lugged home my knife kit so julienning some veggies took very little time. I wanted some protein, so a scrambled egg later and having drained the noodles, I put everything together and got this. I'm not sure if it's blasphemous to the cooking gods, if they exist, for me to put my skills to fancying up instant noodles. Whatever - it tasted good and I probably got my day's serving of vegetables in the dinner.It's too soon after dinner but I am too sleepy to be able to stay up much longer. Until next time, may you have unbroken and satisfying sleep.
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