Week 12 at San Francisco Cooking School

Week 12 has come and gone, and I still have all my fingers.

We've started working on pastries!  We kicked off the week with more pasta and pastry dough.  We made a savory tart for quiche, and a sweet tart for a dessert tart.  I made an awesomely delicious quiche with caramelized onion, mushrooms and garlic with gruyere cheese, and then I came home and made another quiche! 

Brandon Jew, of Bar Agricole, came to our class and we worked on a duck recipe.  We didn't have an actual recipe, Brandon gave us direction and we filled in the blanks.  We of course got to cut up ducks again.  I was on the team that worked on the duck breasts and we had a really awesome spice combination that was rubbed on the duck.  We then smoked the duck breasts and while that was happening we worked on quick pickling some tokio turnips.  It was an interesting day to say the least.  Everyone got to through in their ideas and opinions about what kind of spices we should use and the best way to combine everything.

Sonoko Sakai came to class to teach us more about umami and introduce us to dashi.   It was a bit of a chaotic day but in the end everything we made was delicious.

The rest of the week was dedicated to menu classes where we put up a three course meal.  We made one of the most amazing appetizers ever, a scallop salad with fava beans and turnips in a lovely buttery sauce.  Sooo delicious.  (Pictures courtesy of my classmate Mandy.)

We used our sweet tart dough for a strawberry tart and man was it beautiful.  I can't wait to see what we do with the rest of our yummy pastry doughs.

We're kind of worked into a rhythm in class, it's wonderful to be able to rely on everything to get things done.  We're so much faster and more efficient than we were in the beginning.

:)M

Week 8 at San Francisco Cooking School

We went whole, well half, hog this week!  Thomas McEntee, from 4505 Meats, came to our class to show us how to break down a pig.  As with the lamb, I enjoyed it immensely.  This is a Berkshire Pig, this breed of pig is known for all its awesome marbling which helps give it extra flavor.  This pig was around 200lbs and we got half of it.

A size comparison of the piggy, for your pleasure.  Wilbur was an excellent model, he stayed still the whole time.

I was lucky enough to be the first one to work on the pig, I got to cut off the front quarter of the pig.

As you can see, I'm quite pleased with myself.

We spent the entire morning breaking down the pig into various cuts that we could then cook.  Some things cooked fast, while others (braises and roasts) took longer.  There was pork for pretty much all this week.  And if that wasn't enough, we also worked with beef!  I was a little disappointed to find out we would not be breaking down a cow, or even part of a cow.  I suppose a cow is way too large for us to handle and cook quickly. (The following pictures were taken by my classmate Mandy.)

 Braised pork shank, sauerkraut, cider braised pork belly, and sautéed apple

 Pork shoulder braised in stout

 Pork scallopini with a lemon butter sauce and fried capers

 Pork chops a la charcutiere

As you can see, we were not starving this week.  By the end we all just wanted a salad and a nap.

We started some charcuterie projects this week and got to play with the meat grinder as well as the sausage stuffer.  My teammate Julia, and I made Rabbit Terrine.  I don't know that I'm a fan of terrines mostly because I'm not a fan of cold wet meat, but I guess we'll see.  Other teams made sausages - boubin blanc, and chorizo.  Some teams made crepinettes which are ground meat patty things rolled up in caul fat.  Caul fat has the most vile scent ever.  It's the fat the holds the pig's intestines together, like a little bag.  The end result was delicious but the small while they're being made is horrid.

And finally, we started baking!  We made muffins - orange ginger, bran, oatmeal, etc, as well as some donuts!  We talked about gluten and different kinds of flour and why some flour is better for baking bread, and some is better for pastries.  We talked about how gluten effects your baking and the difference between whole wheat and white flour.  I'm pretty pumped about all the baking we're going to be doing this upcoming week.

Molasses Donuts! (Picture taken by my classmate Harriet.)

It was a wild and busy week.  I came home with about twice as many recipes as usual but it was fun, fast paced, and delicious.  I expect that we'll be getting crazier and crazier from here on out. 

Oh yeh, this week marked the half way point!  I'm half way done with the class room portion of culinary school!


:)M

Week 7 at San Francisco Cooking School or The Silence of The Lamb (singular)

I still have all my fingers and managed not to burn myself.  Hoorays!  We also did something pretty amazing this week.  We butchered a lamb!

This lamb is HUGE!

Dave the Butcher, of Marina Meats, came to our class with a ready to butcher lamb.  Just like with filleting fish last week I discovered that I enjoyed it much more than I ever thought I would.  We used a bone saw to cut through large bones to break down the lamb into more manageable pieces.  Dave had an awesome knife holster for all his knives, it was pretty badass.  We spent 3 hours taking apart the lamb, and every one had a chance to do a little something.

 Meat!

 Dave's awesome knife holster.

Here's a video of my classmate Jen using the bone saw to split the back end of the sheep.

I learned that working with sheep/lamb left my hands super soft.  Sheep fat is actually called lanolin, and it's a waxy substance that feels amazing on your skin.  It's gross, but I kinda wanted to roll around in it.  ("It rubs the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again." - Silence of the Lambs)

We also butchered rabbit, and squab.  This is going to sound psycho, but I honestly really love butchering.  The movements are precise and you have to be focused, it's very zen.  On Friday we ate the squab - grilled, and sautèd.  We also have rabbit legs browned with a dijon cream sauce, and rabbit loin wrapped around kidneys and hearts and browned.  Rabbit legs have the same texture as chicken, and rabbit loins seem to have the same texture as pork.  I still don't enjoy kidney.  We also ate a delicious lamb shank that my team made, slow cooked in veal stock with cilantro and garlic.  Everything was really delicious.  We finished off the day with profiteroles - ice cream filled dessert puffs covered in chocolate.  I borrowed most of the pictures on today's post from my classmate Mandy, so I can't take credit for how beautiful they are.

 Squab!

 Rabbit!

 

 Profiteroles!

I was lucky enough to TA for Chef Nicole Plue this past week.  I was there for the 3rd night of her Pastry: Breakfast & Brunch recreational course.  It was a really great experience.  Nicole is so patient with her students and everything she had them bake was delicious.  We had popovers, egg stuffed brioche muffins, pancakes, olive oil muffins, orange julius, and so much more.  There was also a butter tasting!  Did you know there's such a thing as goat milk butter, because there is and it's amazing!

 Butter tasting and jams.

Overall it was a fast paced and fun-filled week.  Get ready for this next week because we're gonna be butchering Wilbur! (That's a piggy for those who haven't read "Charlotte's Web.") 

And lastly, I finished the Curiosity Crawl!  I believe that I am the first student to finish the crawl so I'm pretty pumped.  I'll let you know what I win.

See you next week!

:)M

Week 6 of/at San Francisco Cooking School

I still have all my fingers, and I've managed not to burn myself.

OMG, this week has been amazing.  It's been the week of "FISH!"  I fileted, gutted, dismantled and pureed fish and other fishy sea creatures this week.  I loved every single minute.  I mostly think I enjoyed it because unlike other animals I don't really care about fish so I don't mind ripping them apart.  I fileted rock cod and petrale sole, and I was honestly pretty awesome at it.  Now when I tell people, "Imma gut you like a fish," I actually know how.

I was really pumped on Thursday when we had Thai Squid Salad.  I specifically request that my teammate, Jeff, and I get to make the squid salad because I really really wanted to dismantle the squid.  I was pleasantly surprise when I told Chef that I wanted that recipe and she gave it to us!  Did you know that squid have a spine piece called a quill?  It's amazing, it's like a piece of plastic in the squid.  Check out this video that shows you how to clean a squid, and imagine me doing it and loving it:

Then on Friday Jeff and I made Shrimp Quenelles, which are essentially shrimp balls.  We pureed shrimp and petrale sole with egg whites, cream, butter and some spices and then poached them in salty water to create these light fluffy shrimp ball things.  It was weird, but pretty delicious.

The sexy squid salad.

We cooked a whole octopus too!  My classmate, Harriet, and I asked Chef Catherine if it was "Paul" the World Cup octopus, and then we got to inform Chef about the famous Paul.  (If you don't know Paul, check him out here.)

My classmate, Mandy, found a stowaway in the mussels we made this week!

I really loved fish week.  While I'm not a big fish eater I really enjoyed learning about how to identify a "good" fish, as well as how to filet and cook fish and other sea creatures.  We also had a great field trip to Monterey Fish Company.  We met up at 5:30am to watch the fish being sorted so that they could be delivered or picked up.  

 

Me and some rock cod at Monterey Fish Market.

I had my first meeting with Chef Catherine to talk about how I was doing in class and it went great.  She told me she liked that I could be so loud/excited/energized but could focus as soon as I needed to.  I told Bob what Chef said and he asked," Did you tell her you don't have A.D.D.?" 

We finished off week 6 with a visit from Courtney from Bar Tartine.  We learned all about fermentation.  Jeff and I pickled Kimchi, preserved lemons, and beets.   We made kimchi with cucumbers, I can hardly wait to try it out!

Next week we're going to butcher a lamb!

:)M

Week 5 of San Francisco Cooking School

Good news, I still have all my fingers and haven't burned myself this week. 

Week 5 brought about my first exam!  EEEEEEK!  Chef Catherine took pitty on us and gave us our recipes for the practical exam in advance.  We had to make a salad with supremed oranges and an orange juice vinaigrette, a root vegetable soup, a velouté sauce and sauté a chicken breast and make a tarragon pan sauce.  Of course before we started making and plating all these things we had a vegetable dicing practical.  How fast, accurately could we dice carrots, celery and onions.  Good news folks, I don't suck at dicing.  :P

In other good news, I passed the practical exam and the written exam.  What I've taken away from this experience is that I almost have awesome time management, and I cannot blindly identify spices to save my life.  Seriously, go open up your cupboard and grab spices and smell them with out looking at them.  It's hard.  Whenever I can't identify a spice I immediately think, "this is probably cumin, or maybe cardamom."  It's usually neither.  I can, however; identify cinnamon like nobodies business - then again, so can pretty much everyone.  

Week 5 was also the week of the duck.  That's right, we disjointed and cooked duck like it was going out of style.  I discovered that I like my duck breast more medium done than rare, and that I still don't care for liver. 

Laurence Jossel, of Nopa, came to visit and talk about restaurant life.  He was really awesome.  He was an engaging speaker and he gave us a good idea of what restaurant life is like.  While talking to us he also assembled a lovely fritatta with potatoes, it was delicious. 

I also had an opportunity to go to a demo from Kindred Table.  Nicole Paizis, was a student in the first class at SF Cooking, and started Kindred Table.  I joined some wonderful Junior League members, courtesy of a friend of mine, for a small get-together and cooking demo and had a chance to talk with Nicole.  It was really great to see what she took away from school and how well she's doing on her own venture.  Nicole made me feel like I was actually cooking in her class even though I didn't touch a single thing.  She did such a great job of describing her process and how all the flavors work together that I felt like I had helped make our meal.  If you're in San Francisco and you're looking for a wonderful dinner event I really encourage you to contact Nicole.  The food and the demo are just amazing. 

Week 5 was a little crazy and hectic.  Everyone was happy when the weekend finally came about.  Whew.

:)M

Week 4 at San Francisco Cooking School

Week 4 went pretty smoothly.  I still have all my fingers and I didn't burn myself.  My poor teammate Tracy, unfortunately burnt herself on that same scary convection oven - it's a beast.  She currently has about a 3 inch long scab on her right wrist.  It's nasty and looks horribly painful.  Hopefully it healed up nicely over the weekend.

This week brought about the revelation that I loath making stock.  Yes, I know it's straight forward, but something about it makes me fume with rage.  I can't put my finger on why, I just know that every day that involves my team making stock I go home disgruntled.  I'm working on making stock be less unpleasant for myself.

We had a couple of awesome visitors this week.  First we had Gonzalo Guzman, of Nopa/Nopalito, come to class and tell us about how he chose the food for the menus, and how certain items are made.  We help grind up corn for masa which was then turned into sopas, and corn tortillas.  He made a couple of really awesome hot sauces and showed us how to pickle onions just using lime juice.  It was a really awesome demo, and we all enjoyed awesome food at the end.

And to finish up the week, on Friday Eugenio Jardim taught us about wine tasting.  We learned about how every wine tells a story before you even taste it.  Soon I'll be able to sound like I know what I'm talking about.  I will of course have to drink more wine. 

We made a lot of vinaigrettes and mayo/aioli this week.  Infused our own oil with herbs, and just generally emulsified our food. 

And of course, we had a lovely plated meal day, here is my sauteed chicken with a mushroom pan sauce and veggies. 

We have a practical exam, and a written exam this week so wish me luck!

:)M