In my last post- which was unGodly long ago- I was nervous for my new class, Quantities. Quantities is the smallest kitchen in the school that must put out the most amount of food (about 4oo plates) in the smallest amount of time (prep is from 8:15-11). My class, being a big class, was going to be cramped and competing for space, equipment, and ingredients. My schedule was sandwich for two days, pasta for two days, then "entree 3" for three days.
Sandwiches went pretty darn well. I was given the option of serving fries or a side with my sandwich. While fries would have been the easy way out (for it wasn't my station to make them), I wanted the freedom to create a side that I thought paired well with my sandwich. The first day was a ruben with a german potato salad and the second day was a gyro with a greek salad (Chef did not approve my idea of hummus with vegetables). Both days were a hit. The Chef (also very new to the class for the previous Chef switched to skills) complimented the potato salad and watched me like a hawk. His past time hobbies included asking me- on the random hour- how many sandwiches I had made and how many I had left to do. This would cause me to run over to my speed rack and count each sandwich then do a very long subtraction equation in my head. On day, out of the corner of my eye, I saw Chef smile when he shouted "KateLynn! How many sandwiches!" "Sixty five Chef and forty to go!" I learned that if I set a certain number of sandwiches per tray and counted as I finished each tray then I would always know my numbers- this was Chef's lesson.
During pasta- I was more proud of my work than in sandwiches but me and my partner felt the strained heat of our conflicting personalities. The first day I was plating a pasta that was virtually mine, in recipe, method, and execution. During service "vegetarian pasta" was shouted and I called back "heard!" meaning I would simply leave out the shrimp as I tossed my lemon-butter sauce over my pasta. When I handed it to my partner to "run" to the front, he refused to take it, claiming he never heard the order. As both him and I got into a shouting match over one plate another student came over to carry it to the front....professionalism points off for me and communication needs to be worked on for both.
Entree three days were the most mentally exhausting. Quantities was unique in the fact that it was the longest class you would ever take. You must be there in the morning at 5:30 to organize the food order and you did not get out until 3. This was much different from the 7-1 schedule we were all used to. Also, if we did not finish prep then we would stay late. This was my first experience in 12 hour days, by the end of the week, I was exhausted. One day in particular my entree was duck, and again Quantities allowed me the freedom to create my own marinade. Considering the sauce for the duck would be a black berry au jus I decided the marinade would be something similar. It was a lovely concoction of red wine, balsamic vinegar, honey, olive oil, black berry puree, parsley stems, and tarragon. It was even lovelier when Chef told me to take the duck breasts out of the bucket they were marinading it and put them into trash bags (this way the large volume of duck breasts would be submerged in the marinade), and the trash bag I grabbed was an unfamiliar white trash bag (our black ones were no where to be found), when the trash bag split open and my beautiful marinade was all over my beautiful chef whites. Luckily my first reaction was to save the food. I dove forward to catch the breasts on the table to stop them from touching the horrible infamous K-16 floor (Kitchen 16 is the location of Quantities). All I had to do was remake the marinade and go home to change my whites...er- my pinks. "Look at it this way" said Chef, "now you smell AMAZING!"
Breakfast
Within a week Breakfast started and if I thought Quantities was hectic hours.....I was in for a surprise. Breakfast class started at 1:30 and ended at 8:15. The first day was the hardest and my sleep schedule molded to my new nocturnal ways. Again my schedule was split into "2-2-3". My first two days was on the fruit station. Fruit was a wonderful start for me. It was very intricate and detailed oriented. You were incharge of smoothies, fruit salad, grape fruit, and one fruit plate. The fruit plate was normally a trio of something and plated to elegance.
"Farq" station was short for Farquarson which was the name for our "cafeteria" (it shames me to call it a cafeteria for it is the most beautiful one I have ever seen) and the duties included making coffee on the hour every hour, setting up the tables, pastries, fruit trees, tea station, and making oatmeal. My first day was a train wreck- to put it kindly. I ran out of coffee, the chef's table was NOT set to his liking, I could not find the baskets for the pastry table, I did not follow the instructions for the oatmeal so 1) it was too sweet and 2) it was late at service. Total disaster. However I approached Chef after class and promised him a better day, and the next day it was nothing less. The coffee was in abundance, the chef's table to perfection, the pastries were all in their appropriate baskets, the oatmeal was hot and in its container, and I in the back doing dishes. Chef was pleased.
Egg station was a phenomenal station for me. It was the glory of the breakfast kitchen and 100% a la minute (at the last minute). It was difficult but I became talented with eggs quickly and re-established my habit for seasoning my food (which was lost in the K-16 rush). The last day of breakfast is "specials day" and every station comes up with one special. However eggs must come up with four specials (one burrito, one scramble, one omelet, and one "more"). Our special burrito was greek, our special scramble was huevos rancheros, our special omelet was a philly cheese steak omelet, and our one "more" was eggs florentine. Huevos Rancheros was my responsibility and I was obsessive about it! My knife work was pristine, my peppers fire roasted, and my veggies all sauted in advance as carefully as I could. First I would start by a splash of clarified butter in the pan and allowed to heat up, then a spoonful of onions and garlic sweated until the aroma was pungent. Then a spoonful of my jalapeno, poblano, red bell pepper (all fire roasted) mixture would hit the pan, along with a spoonful of tomatoes. A ladle full of pre-scrambled eggs would then hit the pan along with salt and pepper and my chopsticks would whisk away over the flame. When the eggs were almost done I would add a spoonful of shredded pepper jack cheese, finish the eggs over the flame and let them hit the plate. In a straight row the toppings were pico de gallo, sour cream, and avocados. Red, white, and green. It was my demo plate and all the egg team gather round with chef to have him taste every plate. He went around with his constructive criticisms then ate a bit of my plate. I could feel my breath being held. As he was chewing he asked me if this was one ladle of eggs. I nodded and told him it was. He told me to use possible 3/4ths of a ladle for it was just a tad too big of a portion. He finished his bite and tells me that the flavor is outstanding, that it was a wonderful plate. The world started moving again and one of my class mates patted my back. It was a wonderful feeling and even more so when Chef approached me during service and asked me to make him a seperate plate for his breakfast that day.
My First Stagie
Some weekend in between Quantities and Breakfast I had one interview for my extern and one stagie (short for the French term "stagiaire" which means apprentice) in the big city. A stagie is a process someone must go through before working at a well known restaurant. This allows the person to see if the restaurant is right for them and the restaurant to see if the person is right for them. My extern was approaching uncomfortably fast and I had no leads. The interview was with the Oyster Bar in Grand Central Station. As soon as I walked in my red warning bell was going off. All the tables were covered in red-checkered table clothes and a live lobster tank was staring at me. It was the BBQ Rib of the sea food world. The Chef was kind and offered me a tour- a mistake on his part. His kitchen was dirty, and his fish were not on ice. He bothered me with his repetition of "equality of women" in his kitchen. The repetition of it made me wonder if it needed to be forced and didn't come naturally. By the end of the tour I was offered the job and had to respectfully decline it- it didn't matter to me how hopeless my extern search was going, as soon as Chef said "I do not care about the quality of the food we produce here, it is about the numbers, the quantity" did I want to run.
The stagie was much different. It was the restaurant Tabla in New York City which I highly recommend to anyone. It is a French-Indian fusion restaurant and grandiose in appearance. The kitchen was clean, the floors were white, and the stainless steal was shinning. The walk-in refrigerators were neatly organized but oddly empty. "This time of year our produce stalk is a bit poor. You see, we buy as locally as we can by going to the farmer's market in central park every weekend, and in the winter there is not much to select from." We then walked into the meat refrigerator, again it was nicely organized, however it was the hanging duck that caught my eye. "We dry-age in house" Chef said. Something I have not seen since my "meat identification and fabrication" day at the CIA. The fish walk in was last, and, unlike my first place, it had no smell, everything was on ice and neatly put away. "Look at this" Chef said pulling out a drawer, "You will never see this again." In the drawer in tight rows lay tine brightly silver fish- they could have been pendents for jewelry they were so beautiful. "These are fresh sardines".
My night ended with a watchful eye on service, a menu tasting, and the disappointing comment at the end of the day. "I am sorry KateLynn, we would love to have You but we just do not have room for an extern this year."
Garde Manger
My extern hunt went on as I entered my final class, Garde Manger. This class was the definition of love and hate for me. The days in which we made hor dourves and made our own cheese I was estatic. When we did plated appatizers I loved the beauty of the food but unlike the freedom I had grown used to in Breakfast/Quantities, Chef would not let me play with the plating. My partner and I might have slipped in our own style anyway. Making my own forcemeats and terrines, were just not my thing. Meaty jello can stay off of a menu anywhere in my opinion.
Grand buffet, however, was a battle. It is possible I have mention grand buffet as the student who ate instead of the student who cooked in this blog before. It is a huge event every three weeks in which the Garde Manger classes and various pastry classes break down and set up an extravagant buffet in the great hall (Farq). The tables are bronze for the culinary students, and white for the baking. The baking department adorns the tables with tall cakes and master piece bread center pieces. The culinary students have a region dedicated to each table. The regions include Spain, Italy, South west, Hudson Vally Local, Germany, Charcuterie, and of course, France!!! I was lucky enough to be given France.
However, in my self exploration in the CIA I've realized how important the vegetarian lifestyle is to me. I was once a vegetarian and I was the most happy when I was (I was not smart and not very healthy, but I was happy!). Re-meeting friends in the vegetarian lifestyle made me ache for it again. Grand buffet was not what one would call vegetarian friendly. Meat jello, gelatin, and chicken stock flooded the food, making Grand Buffet day almost inedible for vegetarians. Knowing this, I approached my Chef in Garde Manger and asked him if I could do a one hundred percent vegetarian table. While Chef and I had some differences, he said yes. Chef said yes to the vegetarian table, but he would not make it easy on me to turn his beloved French table into purely vegetables. My group and I met every night, researching the flavor profiles of France, the different cheese, the different mushrooms- all in order for this menu to develop. After three days we had a beautiful menu in place, but needed Chef's approval. It took another three days to track the man down to get it approved, and prep needed to be started the following day. Our menu included mushroom/barely burger, hazelnut vinaigrette black-eyed pea salad, mushroom confit and brie bruschetta, apricot chutney, brie, cucumber sandwich on walnut bread, roasted pepper salad, blue cheese mousse and Belgian endive, wild mushroom terrine, a sun-dried tomato and goat cheese tartlet, and a cheese/fruit/bread center piece. Our prep ran into several problems, especially with my terrine. Instead of gelatin I was using Agar-Agar a gelatin like substance made out of sea weed. Unfortunately me nor chef has ever worked with the tricky stuff and was trying to get it to set up in the mushroom terrine. Certain prep could not be started until a bread order came in, which didn't come in until the last day, two hours late, and frozen. It was the most stressful three days of my life.
The day of however the presentation was wonderful. Wooden boxes and empty wine bottles gave our table a rustic- elegance, and the food provided the color. I cannot count how many people were ecstatic about a vegetarian table and thanked me and my group profusely. Compliments were made on the food and every felt so right. All the trouble that I had gone through was made worth it by the people enjoying my food.
Extern
Eventually I found an extern and was accepted. I am going to Charleston, South Carolina with my partner in crime from school. She and I drove down together from New York to South Carolina, and if a picture should have ever been taken it should have been of my poor car driving down. Carrying two girls' worth of stuff, was impressive. Every corner was taken up. We were sitting on pillows and comforters. She had a coffee pot at her feet and I was holding a suit case in place with my elbow as I drove. It was a three day trip (stopping periodically to stay with a friend) and learned the intimacy that a long road trip can provide.
She and I are on Kiawah Island working in the Sanctuary resort. It is a world famous golf resort known for its 5-star 5-diamond awards. It's 5 golf courses are in the top 50 and 2 are in the top ten, one of which is the top third (and ocean front). It has numerous tennis courts and ranked number one in the country for tennis resorts by tennis magazine. I, myself, am working in the banquettes department and my friend is working in the pastry department (right next door!).
Last Monday was my first day and although I haven't been working much, it is said it will pick up in April when Easter/Mother's Day/ and weddings start up. So far the freedom I have been granted as an extern is amazing- I have been trusted on the grill station, making She-Crab bisque from start to finish, making a scallop ceviche, and being on an action station for my first banquette (I was carving the prime rib).
Before I end this-very long- update I will include a random fact of the day: Did you know scallops had feet? As I was cutting scallops for the ceviche there were what I would call "scraps" at the bottom of the container and I asked my Sous Chef if I should include those as well. When he told me to through them away I was completely confused. He told me to look at the scallops, they all had little tags of flesh on them- something I had never seen before. He told me that was their feet and they get too tough to eat. I was amazed and he started laughing. He told me that "we coastals" like to mess with "you mid-westerns" (me) by giving us stamps of sting ray for our scallops. I laughed, playing along with his joke, when he reassured me that no- in the past there was scandal about string ray flesh being used for scallops because the taste and texture was similar but the value was completely different. "That's why your scallops don't have feet" he told me.
