I think there's crack in one of my olive oils. Or the balsamic vinegar, not sure. All I know is that I have to limit myself to 1 lettuce a day, drizzled with olive oil, balsamic and a sprinkle of sea salt or else I'd eat more of it. Maybe it's the sea salt...
Random Sunday morning cooking frenzy - my scale wasn't working and I couldn't find the back up so although I was dying to bake, that didn't happen. I cooked instead because you don't need a scale for some of the things. No sea bass at the fishmonger so grilled snapper rice paper rolls.
Verdict: Ok for a first try - I took some down to the Asian grocery store downstairs (they provided the rice paper and fish sauce for the dipping sauce). Wrapping needs a little bit of work but this might be fun for an interactive dinner.
Not so easy to find the motivation to cook /practice if you don't have people to cook for and if you haven't quite finished rearranging your kitchen...I've rearranged mine a couple of times, to the point where I've forgotten where I put various pieces of equipment.
Dinner with some friends on Saturday night so I made some tartlettes with mushroom duxelles and then a little puff pastry (store bought) served with goat's cheese, tomatoes and beetroot. I forgot to charge my camera so I didn't get a photo of the yummy dinner that AC made - normally I hate the taste of pork but this was so delicious I actually had seconds. And of course a good cheesy sauce is good on pretty much anything - cauliflower with dinner - felt totally spoiled.
Hopefully next time I will remember to charge the camera for photos. In the meantime, happy Canada Day, 4th of July and Bastille Day!
I thought it was too good to be true when the delivery company said that the boxes from London would arrive between 12:30pm - 1:30pm yesterday. I should have listened to the doubting voice but as always, it was shouted down by the unbridled enthusiasm of my hopeful side.
Let's just say that any intentions I had of going to the office after said delivery were scuppered when I called them at 2:30 to ask where my boxes were since I hadn't received any phone calls or emails re status. Very apologetic, etc. etc. I suggested that perhaps they ought to give the more realistic time frame of "between 12:30 - 4:30pm". The man said maybe that would chase away customers and I told him it would help them plan better because it wouldn't mess with any plans they may have made.
Anyway - boxes eventually arrived and I started looking for the essentials: my winter coats and the coffee maker. Thank goodness I haven't actually put anything in the spare room other than drying laundry and the bookcase...
However, it feels like the disjointed pieces of my life are finally coming back together as the various elements gather back into one physical spot. No longer do I have the excuse of "the [recipe/Kitchen Aid/tarte rings" are somewhere between London and Sydney/sitting in customs/quarantine so I can't cook". Most of the things are now either put away in the kitchen or in one of the boxes in the spare room.
Also finally discovered that one of the hard to reach corners in the kitchen...actually pulls out for easy access. I only moved in a couple of years ago so it's nice to know that there are still things I am discovering.
And the reason I was late to work this morning (besides hunting out more winter clothes because it's freezing...I think I accidentally used the cappuccino attachment for the milk so I am going to try the other one tomorrow. In the meantime - my first real coffee at home in eons. Or at least in longer than I remember. The unused French press has gone to the office where it will actually be appreciated and used, instead of languishing in the back corner of a cupboard where it's too high for me to reach without a chair. I have managed to resist buying a stepladder thus far but am afraid the height which I can reach in the various cupboards may require that I buy one in the near-ish future.
Until next time - may you find the things you are looking for without too much difficulty.
I am finally back in Sydney and getting settled back into my "normal" life.
The flight back to Sydney was uneventful, preceded by the usual countdown of "last"s whenever I am getting ready to leave for somewhere (last brunch, last sunset, last dinner, last night in front of the TV with my sister)...she records The Game of Thrones when I'm home and we watch it together later at night, when she has time for herself. Of course, there's no way she's going to wait for me to come back to watch the rest of the series so hopefully they won't get erased off the recorder when she's finished.
My flat is a bit of a shambles - half unpacked suitcases in the hallway by the front room, paperwork in piles on my dining table and a complete lack of enthusiasm to put anything away with the spectre of another 11 boxes to arrive from London with the remaining bits and pieces for the kitchen.
Chatting to friends has revealed that quite a few of us are returning to our jobs and hoping to balance that with opportunities to keep up with what we've learned. Perfecting anything will be difficult when we don't do it every day but hopefully my notes will be good enough to get me through it. Or else there will be lots of awful experiments which I can't inflict on my beloved family and friends.
It turns out that quite a few people have been practicing various things. I had another run at my dessert from my final, taking into account the chefs' comments but without the sauces and glaze or tempered chocolate. I used the reduced syrup from poached pears in the salad above (poached pear in Lambrusco - an Italian sparkling red dessert wine, infused with cloves, cinnamon - with beets, goat cheese and mixed baby greens in a vinaigrette) because I didn't have a sauce but my parents seemed to like it. All I could thing was "coulda, woulda, shoulda" and how things might have been different if this is what I had done during the Patisserie finals. However - as a good friend says, a pass is a pass and at least I managed to get this done at home which is nice.
As I said to one of the chefs - I don't have what it takes to work in a restaurant kitchen, but I'll be an acceptable home cook. Well - maybe occasionally able to make something a little bit more fancy than a muffin or cupcake should the occasion demand. Generally home cooking still stays in the realms of comfort food but at least I have the recipes, notes and pictures if I want something a little more complicated.
So until next time - happy eating.
After we all received our pass confirmations, it was time for a few well deserved drinks. It was a warm March day so we all gathered in the courtyard outside the LCB Cafe. There's a pub there so they provided us with drinks (and me with food) - there's a student discount, which was a bit of a bonus for our very last day as students.
We gathered for the last time - the others would see each other at graduation but I was due to get on a plane the following morning so this was our last chance to say hello. Several of us also had quite a bit of packing up to do and limited luggage space in which to do it. One of the things about missing graduation is that I wouldn't get to wear the chef's hat or get the medals from the chefs. CB, one of the very nice people in LCB administration went upstairs to get my medals because they weren't going to be included with my diplomas which would arrive by post. I carefully wrapped up the hard-won pieces of metal and packed them in my bag. Then I had several rounds of repacking, with the result that it took me a couple of days and virtually unpacking everything when I got home to find them again (carefully tucked away in a plastic container). My sister and my parents requested that I wear them while cooking - all I could think of was the universal horrified look which would cross one of the chef's face at such a suggestion...
Life after LCB...
The last couple of weeks since I got home have been pretty busy. I'm not sure how, since I'm theoretically on vacation...some of it, of course, has been spent cooking for family and friends. There's a certain expectation when you come home and you (theoretically) have been trained how to cook, that you will cook for people.
The difficulty is learning to differentiate between cooking / playing time and a cooking / time sensitive time. That is to say, teaching that difference to well meaning friends and family. It's sweet people want to participate but as one of my brothers told me, they don't (so he claims) know what they're doing and it's all about fun. Which is fine, as long as their fun time isn't my time sensitive time because then it just stops being fun for everyone. (Let's just say that trying to grill stuff on a grill which needs to be fired up and trying to make a theatre time is not the stuff of relaxing and fun dinner preparation. Neither is fancy plating.)
A simple lunch turned out to be quite a large one. What was meant to be lunch for 4 somehow rapidly expanded to 6, then 9...an example below of our simple lunch - grilled fresh mahimahi, grilled lemongrass/keffir lime/ garlic shrimp, salad with vinaigrette and grilled veggies. My brother had been dying for fresh fish and as we had a pescatarian, this was friendly for all. I still have dreams about cooking, but I'm hoping those dreams will get fewer and further in between. It's no fun when the dishes are imperfect even in dreams - surely that must say something?
You say potato, I say potahto...
There's a place called Diamond Head Market and Grill here. Several people are completely in love with their blueberry scones. I have a slightly difficult time with this because the scones I'm used to (Australian/English influence) have always been circular ones which slightly resemble the biscuits of the American Southern cooking: slightly crisp-ish on the outside and soft and fluffy on the inside. The scones I've had in the US usually resemble...triangular heavy dough things which could take out an eye, so I was doubtful about the blueberry scones.
I was immediately suspicious when I saw these large things because they were so shiny - yup, coated with some sort of sugary thing. But actually quite delicious. They put cream cheese in the batter so that gives it extra moisture and it's nice and kind of oozy and gooey when fresh out of the oven (first thing in the morning will do that). I'm not a huge lover of sweets but I have to say that the next time I have a sweet craving, I might just head over and get one of these. Perhaps tomorrow morning, if I get up early enough to eat one before ballet class - have to have enough time to digest it so that turning doesn't make you want to hurl. That's not so elegant - not to mention it's a dead giveaway to the teacher that you haven't been spotting. For more on spotting, I suggest you watch an episode of Gilmore Girls (the one where Rory is getting ready for her debut with the Daughters of the American Revolution).
Several evenings...with Schroeder and friends
It has been a music filled week leading up to Easter. There was a wonderful concert last week - the soloist was Something Wolfram or Wolfram Something (from NY? I don't have the program anymore or I would be able to tell you) and he played Beethoven's 4th Piano Concerto. He was this tall, imposing fellow who was so tall they had to lower his piano bench so that he could fit his legs under the piano. It reminded me of Schroeder from the Peanuts comics - Wolfram's knees weren't quite up to his ears, but they weren't far off.
The newly reconstituted Hawaii Symphony Orchestra then played Dvorak's New World Symphony. One of the oboists (coincidentally she's also the English horn) is staying with us so we got a little preview while she practiced - anyway, wow! I asked later - she and the bassoon had discussed the blend of their sound and it sounded wonderful at the concert.
Later on in the week, we went back for another concert: Russian Easter Overture (Rimsky Korsakov), the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto and Tchaikowsky's 5th Symphony. I forgot how long the symphony was and I kept nodding off in the last movement. Oh, the whiplash! Still, an enjoyable night and sweet lullabies...
Easter
The end of this trip is drawing to a close, marked by my first Easter at home in over 10 years. It was a beautifully (mostly) sunny Sunday. We started with Easter breakfast by the water. It was supposed to be brunch but they did a couple of seatings and we left the arrangements sufficiently late that the only table we could get was at 9am. Slight rate of attrition due to the early hour, but I like to think we acquitted ourselves well. After the first couple of rounds to warm up (coffee, water, coffee, omelette, bacon, fried rice, coffee, some kind of BBQ chicken) the non-vegetarians went for the meats. I headed for the prime rib (how could you not? It's not something you would be cooking at home for breakfast - or at least, not something I would cook at home because you'd have to be up at the crack of dawn to do it), more rice and more bacon. Bacon makes everything better...
Eventually defeated by the limited capacity of our bodies (stretched to their absolute limits) we headed for the water after applying copious amounts of sunscreen. Yes, you can get into a swimsuit and get in the water, but to describe what we did as "swimming" would be like saying...actually, I'm in too much of a food coma to come up with a suitable simile. More accurately, I think you could say we dipped ourselves - just enough to cool off. I was going to do some reading this afternoon but fell asleep instead - and woke up just in time to make it to Easter dinner (another buffet! Thank goodness I'm going back to Sydney and cooking for one) where I'm sure I stretched my capacity for food intake once again. I don't really cook when it's just me so I took the opportunity of having quite a large supply of guinea pigs at home.
Now it's time for a second attempt to read about transferring proceedings from one court to another and the biggest challenge of all: staying awake long enough to process it so that I can remember it tomorrow. Finding the time to get caught up on readings has proved to be quite a challenge between all the things I have to do (unpack, repack, etc. etc.), the cooking and the resting. I've been sleeping a lot since I got back - I think the stress of finals still hasn't fully worn off - I seem to remember not sleeping more than 6 hours or so on a given night during March and there's still a little bit of jetlag although that finally seems to be abating.
So until next time, happy Easter/Pesach and happy eating!
Today was a day of tears: tears of stress, tears of nervous anticipation, tears of worry and unalloyed terror and finally...tears of relief.
Yes, it's official - I passed both of my practical exams although the Patisserie one was a very near thing. It wasn't anywhere near what I would have called even a good effort in terms of technique, having done every single element better previously (and actually, same for the Cuisine final) - but it was done and it was enough to get me through. I heard someone who is progressing through the levels tell someone else that now they are nervous - well, I can't help the tears which came with the relief of finally knowing, one way or the other.
The rundown
Friday's Patisserie was a nightmare. It started with a dream during the night in which I was already in my exams, but then I woke up and I actually had to do it. Who knows how long the dream lasted, but I was working on my sable biscuits in it - and in that odd, dreamlike way that time passes, it seemed like it had been going for days.
It was time to get equipment and things ready for the exam room - my bag had been packed the night before and all extraneous knives had been removed from my knife kit. Eventually found the bread knife and the cleaver I had removed for the Cuisine final - in a box with odds and ends when I tidied up my room. See, it might look more tidy with things put away, but then I can't get my hands on things so tidy is not the same as organized.
The first 3 hours of my exam were great - the brioche was done on time and proving in the prover (although I had initially written down the wrong time, I had written the start time so it was easy to fix) and the sable dough was done. The bain maries were set up for the chocolates, my lemons zested, juiced and on the stove, ready to start reducing when we were allowed to turn on the heat and the raspberries with the sugar on another burner, ready to go for the jelly. They have a rule that in the 1st hour, you may not turn on your stoves.
Turned the stove on as soon as I was allowed to so that things could do what they needed to do. I set up my tray for the truffles (paper, wire rack) and baking trays for the jaconde biscuit (the cake sponge for my dessert) and tuiles. The brioche was chilling in the fridge so I tempered the chocolate and checked on the lemon juice and raspberries, both merrily heating but not boiling away - perfect, right?
In which the cascade starts
Somewhere in the 4th hour, things started to go wrong. I was all of a sudden starting to get a little behind and I'm not sure why. The melted butter for my sponge had disappeared off my stove when I wasn't looking and I thought I had messed up the sponge (no, it turned out ok) but it was time to make the mousse. The jelly was already setting in the blast chiller and the chocolate twirls were in the fridge but all of a sudden - my lemon juice and zest for the mousse were no longer on my stove. There was no chance of sabotage because everyone was making different desserts and I wouldn't have taken the pots to the washup because I needed them - but where was the lemon juice? The chef went to investigate but all of a sudden my timing was off. The sugar couldn't get started because the mousse had to set while I did the sugar and my truffles hadn't been capped - already a problem because it was so cold in the Patisserie that the chocolate was too cold when I flooded the mould and the shells were very thick - I knew they weren't going to score high...what do you do when you know that things aren't going well and you can't fix it? You keep on going and hope that somehow it works out. Had to keep going but there were a few moments when it would have been nice to curl up in a little ball under my station and just wait to wake up so that I could do my exam for real. Except this was real and it was starting to feel horrible.
Towards the end, I knew I wasn't going to get the biscuits done in time because I didn't have enough time to chill them down as much as I needed to - a lightning decision to salvage what was possible - take them out early (delineations of the colors got lost, lost a bunch of points for technique and presentation) and presented them less than half baked because I was already 5 minutes over (automatic 10% deduction) and didn't want to get disqualified by going over the maximum time. There is a certain agonizing pain that comes with presenting something you know is sub-par but there was nothing to be done except hope for the best and hope it was enough.
Debrief
Waiting for the results was absolutely excruciating. On the one hand, not knowing means that there's always a glimmer of hope - you haven't failed until they tell you that you did. On the other hand, waiting to know one way or the other leaves you unable to think of anything else. Despite everything I could do to keep my mind off it (tons of laundry, packing and re-packing, multiple ballet classes in the same day, going out with friends) somehow it always came back to the nauseating finale of the Patisserie. I knew the Cuisine exam wasn't as good as the mock exam but the Patisserie - it was touch and go as to whether I had passed. Failure meant no Patisserie Diplome, no Grand Diplome (and trust me, it's a big piece of paper) and could almost seem to be a waste of having returned to London to finish the last month of classes. Of course there's a bright side (seeing the new school, using the new equipment, being back in London) but the silver lining was hard to see under the doom and gloom of a possible failure.
So - how did it all go?
Cuisine:
Chef EB told me I should go to France for 5 years and eat out at restaurants more. Yes, chef! I think he told a lot of people that they should go to France and eat there more, though - at least 5 other people in my group were told the same thing. Oddly enough, the dishes were better during the mock exam although the timing was definitely better for this one. Managed to have a respectable plate although the detailed comments weren't available due to a computer glitch. Good - I don't need to know about my hollandaise or my tartlet which I know could have been better. I'm sure they would have said the turning could have been better, some veggies overcooked (turnips again?), some veggies undercooked (carrots?) and who knows for the rest of it?
"Congratulations - you passed." Even though I had felt quite confident about the Cuisine final, I didn't realize how tightly I'd been strung while waiting to hear those words until the tears started. The release of some of the tension was almost unbearable, especially as Patisserie debrief was next and the tension ratcheted back up almost immediately, even worse than before. I exited the debriefing room for a hug from classmates who were going through the same thing. Some concern from the others as they saw my tears - "What happened? Did you pass?" A sigh of relief as I nodded, then congratulations all around as we said them to each other as each person exited a debriefing room (the Cuisine and Patisserie debriefs were in adjacent rooms - I am guessing it's because a few of us had to go to both rooms).
Patisserie:
Chef CB's comment about my tuiles - "cremated". Well, that's about right - I'm not sure what happened - the temperature in the oven at home must be a little different from the one at school - hard go gauge, I didn't use the oven thermometer at home. Also - a tuile and the backup broke during plating so marks were deducted for the plates not being identical, although since all the elements on the plate were present, I got credit for that and the portfolio.
And then the compulsory items...brioche - a bit tasteless (needed more salt) and the head was crooked. Otherwise, ok.
Truffles - white chocolate went out of temper (again!) and the shells were too thick, the caps uneven, but the ganache had a good texture, technique was fine and tasted very nice (yes, the extra 5 drops of Framboise helped, I think).
Sable biscuis - were not cooked, not chilled enough before cutting, etc. etc. No points for taste because it wasn't cooked so they wouldn't have tasted the biscuits. Evil petit fours - I saw some on a menu the other night and ended up pushing it away with a shudder, unable to think about the ones I had presented on the cakeboard.
Coulis needed more sugar, the glacage was a bit too runny, mousse was nice, jelly was too jelled and at the bottom of the mousse instead of in the middle and the sponge needed more syrup (which also had Framboise in it. I soaked the sponge well, but maybe I should have done the sides too...) Messy plate, messy sauces...it could have been so much better. The white chocolate twirl was way too thick - I probably should have used the small teeth on the comb but was too nervous I'd melt through them while plating - my fingers tend to run hot which sucks when working with dough or sugar or chocolate.
Then the sugar...oh dear - let's just say it was not good - but I'm glad I managed to get it done at all and it was still standing when it got downstairs - a relief since the sugar kind of got overcooked at the initial stages. I don't have a photo of it (for my reference only) but let's just say that it fell far short of what I had hoped to produce.
"Despite all that, you passed." More tears, a hug and a kiss before heading downstairs to clean out my locker. What a relief to know that it hadn't all been in vain and although the day produced a crappy performance, it was enough to get me through to the end.
Nor was I the only one to cry from the sheer relief of knowing finally - and knowing that we had done it. There was more than one person who was still upset about the performance we had handed in on the exam days and we compared notes in terms of what we had been told - quite a few of us were told our dishes didn't taste so nice (hence the the suggestions that we live in France and eat out more), as well as other problematic areas of our techniques and things.
I do want to re-do and try out some of the suggestions the chefs made - I'm sure I can do better than I did. Now just to figure out a way to do it...some things are easier to try at home than others and although my sugar pretty much sucked, I am so glad I don't have to do it again.
So until next time, may you find that the effort you put in is worth the final result.
For better or for worse...
Cuisine final is over and I am still recovering. 15 of us going into the kitchen - they had people going in 2 by 2 (opposite sides of the kitchen) and I was second to last - had to wait almost an hour before I got to go in and set up my station. There was last minute panic in the hallway, a few questions for the Patisserie chefs who were walking past as they set up for their tasting from Group C and a few nervous trips to the bathroom. At least it was before and not during the exam...
There have been sporadic instances this week where I just wanted to curl up in a little ball on the floor and have a nervous breakdown. But we don't do that - we're chefs and we deal with it. Or as one of my friends told me when I told her I just wanted to die, "do it after the exam." As you can tell, we're a sympathetic lot. The bright side is that the feeling does go away - eventually - and there are 4 of us from my cuisine group who will be repeating this experience on Friday morning in staggered starts. The enthusiasm with which we look forward to Friday is as palpable as that which might accompany a doctor's appointment which involves taking off your clothes and being put in positions you normally wouldn't engage in with someone who isn't your spouse / lover / [insert word of your choice here]. It has also reduced even those of us with pretty extensive vocabularies to mostly 4-letter words which you wouldn't say in front of the very young or the extremely elderly, especially when something boils away. You will note that I have not said "boiled over" - I stopped doing that last Thursday.
The exam...
I didn't take in my time plan because I figured if I had to check it too often I'd been in deep s#$* and looking at it wouldn't fix matters whereas looking at my mise en place told me where to go next. It was a busy but not horrific 4 hours and if it hadn't been for the couple of things which went wrong (and if I had had another couple of pots and burners) I think I could have done it in a little less time.
Things were pretty on track in terms of timing right up until I had to plate my starter. Of course that's when things start to go pear shaped. I recovered from burning my carrots (had to scoop out a couple more, but luckily I had a whole extra carrot so that was no drama) and burning away my wine (for the Hollandaise) twice. Then...as I was starting plating, disaster struck - my egg broke and the backup wasn't usable because it looked awful. So I had to poach another egg. This then threw off my hollandaise schedule a little bit and it was cold by the time I had to plate it - so I tried to recover it with a little hot water - hopefully it didn't split but it started to look thin although it went over the egg fine. This time I remembered the lemon and the salt so although the tartlet didn't look as pretty as during the mock exam (and I didn't make a spare) hopefully it will taste better. Also - I presented 2 minutes early! I suppose I could have used those 2 minutes to try to fix the hollandaise a bit more, but really, I wasn't in the mood to mess with it any more than I already had.
Then the main...everything on track again except for a minor hiccup with the mousse which I will tell you about after the debrief on Monday. I also dropped the bowl which had my pigeon legs marinating in it, so I had to clean up the floor and wash the legs (I was going to do that anyway). I don't know how that affects the hygiene marks - I didn't have any spare pigeons and I had to make the legs so since they were going to cook in gently boiling oil for about an hour or so, I figured any bugs would be long since cooked away. The dish ended up looking quite nice - I think everything was there, including the parsley chiffonade. And finally the pigeon was cooked, but it's possible one of them was slightly over - ugh, will it never go right??? Time - 2 minutes over because I had to clear my station down so that I could plate - and there were a lot of components: glazed vegetables, cutting the bottom off the braised and stuffed lettuce, the sauce, the chiffonade, the potatos fondant, the confit pigeon legs where we have to debone the thigh, then pan fry to get the skin crispy (and which took forever), the glaze for the stuffed/braised lettuce and the sauce. Think one pot or something similar for each of those things which then has to go on 2 very hot plates.
My station was a shambles. It seemed like crap was proliferating everywhere, but never the stuff I needed. Another small pot would have been nice (we had an extra one during the mock exam so it was a real nuisance not to have one today). Also, they said we could trade our used pots for clean ones, but there weren't any in the washup area for the first hour of my time so I either washed my own or I had to do other stuff while waiting for my pots to get cleaned - I can tell you where my 2 minutes went. In the meantime, there was quite a bit of "hot pan!" and "mind your backs" but otherwise, it was intensely quiet in the kitchen except for the sound of pots going on stoves and oven doors opening. Oh, ridiculous - I couldn't open my oven unless I used both hands, which meant a little bit of juggling. Small in the grand scheme of things, but awful when seconds count.
Good night...
The next time you hear from me, hopefully the Patisserie will also be finished and I will be able to tell you that it felt good. Until then, may you have enough pots and pans (or whatever) to do what you need to do. And may you beat the clock...
I think there's crack in one of my olive oils. Or the balsamic vinegar, not sure. All I know is that I have to limit myself to 1 lettuce a day, drizzled with olive oil, balsamic and a sprinkle of sea salt or else I'd eat more of it. Maybe it's the sea salt...
Random Sunday morning cooking frenzy - my scale wasn't working and I couldn't find the back up so although I was dying to bake, that didn't happen. I cooked instead because you don't need a scale for some of the things. No sea bass at the fishmonger so grilled snapper rice paper rolls.
Dinner with some friends on Saturday night so I made some tartlettes with mushroom duxelles and then a little puff pastry (store bought) served with goat's cheese, tomatoes and beetroot. I forgot to charge my camera so I didn't get a photo of the yummy dinner that AC made - normally I hate the taste of pork but this was so delicious I actually had seconds. And of course a good cheesy sauce is good on pretty much anything - cauliflower with dinner - felt totally spoiled.
