Lesson 4: CHEESE and herbs!

Today was a FUN day because we got to try lots and lots of cheese!  But first, we got to class and set up our cutting board stations and got ready for our second chopping lesson.  We were each given 3 potatoes to medium dice.  I finished a little early and was able to practice my small dice on a couple of carrots.  A pretty easy and short chopping lesson.  

As we cleaned up our stations, Chef Allen took out the cheese and all of our mouths started watering.  He told us we'd have to sit through the nutrition lecture before we were able to try the cheeses.  We reluctantly sat through an hour of nutrition, where he mostly told stories about how he can't stand vegetarians and vegans.  Then it was cheese time!  We started out with the mild cheeses, like brie and manchego.. then ended with blue and goat cheeses.  We also had 4 baguettes and french butter.  I seriously felt sick by the last cheese and was ready to go into a cheese coma.  

While we were sampling cheeses, Chef took our medium diced potatoes and showed us how to par boil and saute them.  He put them in generously salted water and let it come to a boil.  Then he drained them and immediately spread them out on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.  He heated up some clarified butter in a saute pan until it was extremely hot.  He put the potatoes in the pan and lowered the heat.  After flipping them a couple of times, he let them slow cook for about 20-25 minutes.  The result was a salty, buttery, crispy potato.  I can't wait to try it on my own!

Next, he took out a variety of herbs and told us what they were.  We were able to smell and taste them and tape some of them to our notebooks.  Tomorrow we have a quiz where we have to identify those same herbs.  I know herbs pretty well, so I wasn't too worried.  I taped some marjoram, cervil, and curly parsley to my notebook just in case.. since I'm not used to working with those herbs.  I'm going to start bringing my camera to class to I can try and take some pics to show you all.  One girl did that today with the cheeses and I kicked myself for not bringing my camera!  TGIF tomorrow!  I hate to say it, but I am pretty excited to have a couple of days off... traveling into the city every day is starting to get a bit tiring!

Lesson 3: Introduction to Knife Skills

Today was a pretty exciting day because we finally got to take out our fresh knives and put them to work!  We began today's lesson with vegetable ID.  I was hoping we would get to taste the different veggies, but he basically just showed us some of the more foreign vegetables and explained what they were and how to cook with them.  

Next, we set up our cutting board stations and each grabbed a pepper, carrot, celery stalk, tomato and onion.  We got our first lesson on chopping and then small diced our first tomato.  I love chopping vegetables and have a lot of experience chopping, so I had no problem doing the small dice. We went into the harder cuts, like julienne, fine julienne, brunois, and fine brunois.  I was extremely happy to get positive feedback from Chef Allen as he complimented all my cuts and said they were "perfect" and "beautiful"  wahoooo!  

At the end of class a lady came in to talk about careers in the food industry and Chef Allen heated up some fresh bread for us to snack on :)    

That was pretty much it for the day.. tomorrow we're going to do more chopping and learn how to do a medium dice.  We're also doing cheese ID tomorrow which I'm sure will be very delicious!!

Lesson 2: Sanitation, Culinary History, and Dairy ID

I have to admit, I was still a little bit nervous for day 2 of school.  Definitely a lot less nervous than yesterday, but I still had butterflies in my stomach.  When I got into the city  I went into whole foods and grabbed some lunch... I brought it with me to school and ate in the school library while I browsed some food magazines.  

At 12:30 I headed up to the 14th floor to suit up in my uniform and prepare for class.  I was really surprised I wasn't the first one ready, since I'm always at least 15 minutes early for EVERYTHING.  I talked to another girl before class started, whose name is also Allison.  She's from Orlando and dropped out of college because she hated business and wanted to pursue her passion.  She just moved up to Brooklyn 2 weeks ago and is still adjusting to the fast paced environment.  

Today we finally were able to go around the room and introduce ourselves.  I always hated this at Elon,  but  I really enjoyed it here because I was so curious where everyone came from and why they chose to come to culinary school.  I found that most people were just unhappy with what they were doing and decided to pursue their passion.  Ironically one boy works in the Nordstrom cafe  at the Freehold mall, where I worked since I was 16.  Another girl's brother currently goes to Elon, where I went to school!  Soo weird how out of the 14 other people in my class, there are those connections that bind us together.  

Chef Allen lectured a bit about sanitation and culinary history.   The information was a little boring and tedious and I found myself taking notes like, "Wash hands, Brush teeth, Wash hair immediately after class"... DUH!  Then we got to the good stuff.. Dairy ID.. Our first tasting!  He took out different milks and then gave us little tastings of a secret ingredient.  I immediately knew what it was based on the sour, slightly creamy taste.. buttermilk.  Some people thought it was yogurt or sour cream, but based on the consistency I knew it was buttermilk.  Chef Allen made fun of my face when I tasted it and guess that I didn't like it so much.. yuck.  Next we tasted something absolutely wonderful... sweetened condensed milk.  I could eat a whole can of this!  Kind of tastes like liquid frosting.. sweet and creamy and delicious!  He passed around a french baguette and we tasted some french butter, which didn't taste all that different from regular sweet cream, unsalted butter.   At the end of class we also had some dark chocolate covered nuts from the class next door.. delish!

We got out of class early and I was able to catch the 5:03 train home and be home for cocktail hour with my parents :)    Tomorrow is my first knife lesson which I'm PUMPED about!  The tastings tomorrow include all types of vegetables..and I happen to LOVE vegetables.. Tomorrow's definitely going to be a good day :) :)

Lesson 1: Orientation!

I survived my first day of culinary school!!!! I started getting EXTREMELY nervous last night and was very very emotional.. I was worrying if my uniform was ironed enough, if I would fit in or be really embarrassed on the first day.. I didn't really know what to expect, so I was flat out terrified.

This morning I woke up after having stressful nightmares all night about being late for class and was still really nervous. I got up super early even though I didn't have to catch the train until around 10:20. I gathered my freshly ironed uniform, my insanely heavy toolkit, and kissed my mom goodbye as I headed out the door for my first day of culinary school.

As I was on the train I started listening to music and calming down.. the nerves finally went away and I started getting excited again. I have this fear of being late for things, so I got to the school super early. I figured I should since it's the first day and I have to get my locker, knife kit, books, etc. After checking in at the registrar, I stumbled up to the 14th floor to find my locker.. I was practically falling over trying to carry all of my heavy bags. Obviously, I couldn't find my locker. I looked out in the hall with the other lockers and it wasn't there...so then I went into the women's locker room... it wasn't there. I looked back in the hallway and back in the locker room and then down the hall.... I HAD NO IDEA WHERE MY LOCKER WAS.. I was sweating bullets and felt like such an idiot until I heard some other new students asking for help to find their lockers. So, I finally gave in and asked someone. I was directed into the women's bathroom (who knew they had even more lockers in there) and changed into my uniform. I looked into the mirror and couldn't believe that I was all suited up for my first day of culinary school.

I went into the hallway and realized I didn't know what kitchen I'm supposed to be in.. ugh I'm a mess. The director of student affairs saw me looking around confused and told me that I'll be in kitchen 1402, but it wasn't set up yet so I had to wait. In the meantime, I introduced myself to 2 other new students that wandered out in the hallway. One girl seemed really sweet and also went to college and decided to come to culinary school to pursue her (second) passion. She majored in music and is from Dallas. The other guy seemed nice too.. he's from the Bronx and decided to try out culinary school because college didn't work out for him. Around 1, we all gathered into our classroom that we will be in everyday until we graduate in May. The director of student affairs talked to us first for over 2 hours, going over the guidelines, policies, etc.... pretty boring stuff. I was waiting for them to suggest we play an icebreaker game/name game...but culinary school is no Elon. Our chef instructor, Chef Allen, continued the class by going over our curriculum for module 1 and giving us a brief tour of the class and some cleaning procedures. We got our knife kits and started putting them all into the protectors and into our cases.. I am verry scared that I will seriously hurt myself with those knives! They are very very sharp! 2 students already cut themselves today just by putting them in their cases. On Wednesday we will begin our introductory knife skills.

All in all, it was a pretty successful day. We got out of class 15 minutes early and I was able to catch the 5:26 express train back to Matawan. My mom and I just had a lovely dinner that she cooked for me; spaghetti squash with ricotta and pine nuts. I am exhausted from all the excitement today! I'm so excited to see what I have in store for me the rest of the week!

So soon!

Gah! I got my uniform today!!!   My mom and I took the train into NYC this morning and picked up my uniform. When I saw my name engraved on my brand new chef's jacket, I got the chills and reality set in.  It was a stressful day in the city catching subways and doing a lot of walking..but we had a wonderful lunch at a cafe on 33rd street and had a nice salad with a glass of wine.  I tried on my uniform as soon as I got home and screamed throughout the house "I'M READY FOR SCHOOL!! LOOK AT MEE!!!"  My mom thought i looked adorable and took a million pictures...but I think I just look like a 12 year old boy haha.  We cooked an easy dinner tonight.. grilled some rosemary balsamic marinated chicken for us and skirt steaks for my brother and dad.  I roasted some cauliflower and broccoli and made some spinach seasoned with roasted garlic, nutmeg, salt & pepper, and a touch of cayenne.  A delicious and healthy meal!   

Go Yankees!!

Pasta alla Norma

Today my grandparents came over for dinner and it was my job to figure out a dinner to make that my grandparents would like, who are very picky and only like italian food and nothing too crazy.. and also something my dad would like, who doesn't like most vegetables or anything healthy... and something my mom would like, who doesn't eat red meat or anything that's not healthy.  Sooo, it was extremely difficult but I finally found a recipe from an old Rachael Ray mag called "End of Summer Penne alla Norma".  It's a simple tomato, eggplant pasta dish.  I figured I would get fresh homemade whole wheat pasta, satisfying my health-conscious mom and my dad and grandparents who like the softer taste of homemade pasta.  I figured I would pick out the eggplant for my dad's dish and I picked up some ready-to-bake meatballs from wegmans to add some meat to the meal for my dad and grandpa.  I also substituted parsley for the mint to mix into the ricotta.  Other than that, I followed the recipe almost exactly.. just adding some italian seasoning and crushed red pepper for extra flavor.  I ended up realizing there was wayy too much eggplant to pick out for my dad so I heated up some leftover tomato sauce to top his pasta and gave him extra meatballs, so he was happy. The meal was great.. my mom and I especially enjoyed the flavorful eggplant with the fresh tomatoes and pasta.  The ricotta made it really cream and delectable.  A fresh salad of mixed greens, cherry tomatoes, and craisons made it a perfect meal.  I would definitely make it again!  There's a little bit leftover for lunch or dinner later this week :)    I'll post a pic or 2 later of the pasta, although they didn't turn out great and I forgot to take a picture of a dish made up with the ricotta!  Here's the recipe on rachael ray's website: http://www.rachaelraymag.com/recipes/rachael-ray-magazine-recipes/rachael-ray-30-minute-meals/End-of-Summer-Penne-alla-Norma

Penne with shrimp and tomatoes

Tonight I didn't plan on cooking because I didn't get home until late and me and my parents had leftover pizza from last night.  While we were eating our pizza my brother called to say he was coming home to watch the yankees game.  Of course, he expects dinner when he gets here.... so it was my job to figure out something to cook for him.  Luckily, I LOVE figuring out my own recipes with whatever we have on hand.  I took out some shrimp from the freezer to defrost and checked the cabinets to see what i can add to this shrimp dish.  Here's the recipe that I came up with...and I must say it was delicious, and I'm not even a huge fan of shrimp

1/2 lb. whole wheat penne

1 15 oz. can fire roasted diced tomatoes

1 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil

1-2 cloves of garlic (chopped)

1/2 chopped onion

1 cup cleaned and de-veined shrimp

1 tsp. italian seasoning

1/2 tsp. crushed red pepper

salt & pepper

1/2 cup parmesan

2 Tbsp. chopped parsley

Boil a pot of water for the pasta.  Season the water generously with salt before adding the pasta and cook until al dente.  Meanwhile, heat the olive oil over medium high heat in a large saute pan.  Add the garlic and onion and saute until slightly browned and translucent.  Add the shrimp and cook for a couple of minutes.  Add the diced tomatoes, salt, pepper, italian seasoning, and crushed red pepper.  (Taste it to adjust seasonings).. When the pasta is done, add it to the shrimp mixture.  Depending on the thickness of the sauce, you may need to add a ladle or 2  of pasta water. I added 1 large ladle.  Stir in the parmesan and parsley.  Serve with extra parmesan and crushed red pepper on the side.