Lesson 23: Mod 2! Chicken and Steak

I was very anxious/excited for today's class because it was the first day of Module 2 and we were introduced to our new chef instructor.  Chef Karen greeted us and laid out a new set of rules and instructions to follow for the next 6 weeks.  It's so different for all of us to get accustomed to a new chef who has different ways of doing things..but it is really going to prepare us for the future when we have to work for different chefs or even different clients/customers.  It will also be very helpful to learn different techniques from the different instructors.  

After preparing our mise en place (prepping the kitchen for the day's recipes), we each began trimming flank steaks and chicken breasts and mincing shallots.  We worked individually today to saute a few chicken breasts and portions of steak and make pan sauces for each.  The pan sauces were made simply with shallots, stock, wine (red for steak, white for chicken), and a few pieces of cold butter at the very end.  Sounds simple, right?  Wrong!  It takes a lot of practice working with commercial stoves when you have never worked with them before.  My shallots kept burning and either I didn't reduce the sauce enough or it would be reduced too much.  After a few mistakes with the chicken, I finally got the hang of it when I prepared my steak.  Today was like a trial-and-error day where everybody got to just saute away until they got it right!  After tomorrow and Wednesday's continuation of sauteing I'm sure we will be a lot better!