Roman Holiday

Courtesy of Tasting Table

The Real World

It's been three weeks. New job, new career. First time in over a year that I actually have to return to a 5 day a week work week. My body is in shock. Unlike anything I have ever done before in my professional career, it's labor intensive. I don't sit at a desk all day in front of a computer. No access to the Internet or email for the occasional distraction from work. Just work. I ache. I have not felt this way since before college when I used to get up at 4am and breathe in the familiar smell of fresh shavings and sweet feed. Muck stalls, fill water buckets, get horses ready for their owners big show day, and then in the afternoon, barely able to feel my own muscles, get on my horse for a turn in the show ring. It was tiring, but so worth it. So much fun. I used to love the feeling of being at a big show, seeing everyone else around you that understood what it all meant. Taking a minute from the routine in the early morning to pause for the National Anthem. It was satisfying.

My new job gives me a similar feeling. It's an art. It takes practice. You get scolded for not doing things correctly. You learn, try to be better, faster. If you are not frustrated, you are probably not trying hard enough. There is no tolerance for anything less than perfect. Standards are high. Yesterday we had to trash 100 portions of pasta because of the moisture level in the air, when dropped into the boiling salted water they were not opening up correctly. Sticking together. Everything had to be done over, but with less liquid. Drier dough.

My hands hurt. Kneading anywhere from 10-30 portions of dough a day. Burns from touching hot pot handles opening up. My feet hurt. You don't sit for a second at all during the day. Employee meal is served. You eat standing up. I treasure the moments now when I can have a minute to sit (on the bus or subway). My back hurts. My neck hurts. I carried those very heavy hotel pans into the walk in and had to get them up in the top shelf. I'm short. The floor is slippery. Later, had to go and get them down. It's a miracle I have not injured myself yet.

I have barely eaten any pasta since I started my job. I'm around it all day. I don't want to look at it when I'm not at work. Prepping and tasting ravioli filling all day. The same for the bolognese and the bechemel. Things I used to love. Still great, but now I crave other things. The thing I used to love about Italian restaurants were the fresh, home made pastas. Last week I went to a great place and didn't even read what they had on the menu. Got fish instead.

I love it though. I'm learning a lot. I'm gaining an expertise that others may never have. My pasta maker with the little hand crank from Willam Sonoma looks so puny sitting on the shelf. Can I even use that anymore? The dough I deal with now is like a foot in width and 5-10 feet long. Do I even want to try? It's my Saturday. Maybe. But not today. I can barely move my fingers they are so cramped. Maybe they will feel better tomorrow.

Trying the Shoe on the Other Foot

Last week, I returned to school for my first time as a midterm judge.

It was interesting to say the least.

Although there were 9 of us, only 2 other people were from my class. When we got there we were set up in the bread kitchen (turned dining room for the occasion) across from the level 3 kitchen where the students were hard at work cooking. We immediately noticed a big difference to this class than ours. There seemed to be this calm over them. No one appeared to be running around with their heads cut off. Some students even had smiles on there faces and at one point 2 students actually went for a cigarette break (WTF?!?!?!?!?!? Are you joking me?????????)

Hindsight is 20/20. And I bet when they look back on this evening they will wish they worked with a sense of urgency. Halfway into service when I looked back inside it was complete chaos.

The night started with the potage cultivateur, a cut vegetable soup. I have to say I was quite surprised they were not asked to do the more difficult consomme, but I was happy to get the chance to eat a soup that actually tastes better. The biggest part to this soup is the knife skills you need for it. The soup contains a collection of carrots, potatoes, and turnips all cut into "paysanne", as illustrated in the picture below. The face of the vegetables by definition should be a perfect .5cm square by .1mm in width. I say "by definition", because at the end of the day, all the vegetables should be the same size, and since there are peas in the soup you have to end up cutting your paysanne to match the size of the peas. Overall, the soups were not bad. All of them needed a bit more salt, and one showed beautifully cut vegetables and perfectly cooked peas and green beans (meaning they were still a nice bright green color). Nothing spectacular, but no disasters either.



Until the next course.

Bass en Papillote - below is a picture with an example of a papillote from a student in a previous class. The fish is basically cooked in a sealed parchment paper package. The dish is served with mushroom duxelles and tomato fondue on the bottom with the fish placed on top. Then a very neat julienne of leeks, celery and carrots (all cooked separately) are placed neatly on top of the fish. A sprig of thyme is thrown on top as well as a splash of wine, before the package is sealed and placed in the oven. This dish is very challenging as you are essentially blind baking it. I was thankful to have not have had this dish on my midterm, and really felt bad for these students. The pressure of the midterm is hard enough. Of the 5 served, 3 were completely raw. One was over cooked (better than raw in my opinion because at least I was able to taste this one) but was marred by the fish bone I bit into. However, the 5th and final one was absolutely PERFECT. Cooked perfectly, beautiful demonstration of knife skills with the julienne, great flavor.....just right on the money. Thank goodness, I was getting HUNGRY ;-) The first raw one that came out, it was such an awful shame - this student had the most perfect and exact julienne vegetables I have ever seen. Her mushrooms and tomato fondue were beautiful and flavorful as well. You could just tell that she was an artist when it came to presentation and our Chef even expressed his sorrow as he said she is the top of his class. She just ran out of time in the stress of the midterm and instead of being late and cooking the fish longer, she chose to be on time and take it out knowing it was not yet done. She would have been doomed either way, but thankfully made up for her first course mishap with a home run on her dessert.



The next course was the chicken grand-mere. I must have cooked this dish over half a dozen times at school and practiced it just as many times at home. It's not hard, but time consuming. All the garnishes - bacon, caramelized pearl onions, pommes rissoler (those freaking football shaped potatoes blanched, sauteed and roasted), and mushrooms must be a specific size, cooked in specific way and flavored just right. Not to mention the chicken which should have a nice, brown crispy skin, with the tips of the legs and wings cleaned precisely to remove all skin and sinew to expose the bone. It needs to be cooked correctly, seasoned nicely. And then the sauce - should meet the right consistency, taste good, be carefully strained of any bits and particles and degreased. I had this dish on my midterm and was so far behind in everything else I almost did not get it in the oven in time for it to cook. While none of the dishes that came out were all that good, my own past experiences made me remember how hard it is to nail this one under the time pressure. One sauce was so watery and oily I could not go beyond the first taste. Another was served on a plate so hot that the plate almost made the sauce boil and it came to us completely congealed on top. Another was so incredibly salty with everything on the plate, I could not eat it. Not to mention the completely burned pearl onions. There was one, however, that although not perfect, was seasoned nicely, and on the bright side no one served us raw chicken. Below is a pic of this dish made by another class, but at least gives you a visual.



The fourth and final course was the apple tart. My most despised dish of all of culinary school because of how perfect it is supposed to look. When you are in a hurry, that's a challenge. The crust must be crimped perfectly but we can't use those pretty tart shells that have it cut out already that way. We have to crimp it ourselves. And the apples should be thinly and evenly sliced, with a beautiful brown color when it comes out of the oven. And lastly, the whipped cream - not over whipped, not too sweet, with a hint of vanilla. Overall, all of the tarts tasted good. One was visually spectacular - could have sat in any of the best pastry shops in the City. The others all lacked the finesse and 2 were just down right sloppy. Only one student remembered to serve us our slices on a cold plate.

The one below is from my level 3 class that my partner and I did, as well as an example of the plating we needed to do. Next time I judge a midterm I will remember to use my camera!!!