Fi Fo Fum: Le Cordon Bleu so far

It has been a busy 10 days in London since my last post. I have now completed my second week at Le Cordon Bleu and loving it! We have progressed a long way from simple French cuts of vegetables to preparing and roast a full chicken with jus and broccoli. I have also continued to explore London. I am now living in Kensal Green in a share house with 5 others 4 boys from Melbourne and an English Girl, House is great lots of fun and close to Kensal rise tube station. Each morning I rise at 5:45, to ensure I’m dressed and ready at in kitchen at Le Cordon Bleu by 7:30. Each day I need a fully ironed uniform, perfectly cleaned. There are 8 parts to the uniform, Pants, Chef Jacket, Neck Tire, Apron, Teas Towel, Heat Proof Cloth, Hairnet and Hat as well as black clog shoes, so you can imagine it not a quick process!! As well as uniform we received a full Wusthof Knife Set, engraved with our initials which has every knife and utensil I could possibly need in the kitchen.

Compartment : Utility Knife, Chefs Knifes, Spatula and Craving Knife

Compartment 2: Cleaver, Meat Fork, Boning Knife and Steel Sharpening Rode

Compartment 3: Teaspoon, Tablespoon, Fork, Melen Baller, Zester and Apple Corer

Compartment 4: Serrated Knife, Needle, Scissors, Peeler, and Whisk

Compartment 5: Mixing Spoon, Pairing Knife, Filleting Knife and Pastry Brush.

Zip Compartment has Piping Bag, Temperature Probe, Timer, Lifter and a few other things yet to be discovered!

Engraving

Demo 2: Today we moved on from just cutting to using the cuts to make cold salads and vinaigrettes. I cant remember the proper French names (sorry!). This one was a vinaigrette of lambs lettuce, watercress, curly endive, oak and lollo rosso lettuce with Chives,Tarrigon, Chervi, and Parsley.

Tomato and Basil salad. This included branching and peeling the tomatos and then slicing them thinly. Did you know that you can actually diegesis tomato skin, therefore we first core and score tomatos then place tomato in boiling water for 10-15 second until skin peels back then stock in iced water and peel off the skin.

Carrot and Shallot salad with Parsley. Using a fine julienne cut, they were a bit more consistent this time, I'm getting the hang of it!

Demo 3: Hot Salad

In this practical we were required the make an egg and potato salad, chopped pea,bean,turnip and carrot salad and tomato petals to be all dress with our own mayonnaise which we had to make by hand!!!
This practical we had to make our own mayonnaise, it not an easy thing to do when whisking by hand! It took about 5-10 mins of solid whisking to incorporate the oil into the egg yolks, mustard and vinegar, but the final result was rewarding. We then used the mayonnaise as the dressing for the potato and egg salad and the pea salad with in the photo is topped with sardines and salami.

Demo 4:
Todays dishes were Duxelle Seche Classique (Mushroom Salad), Concasses De Tomatoes (Tomato Salad) with Turned Daikon and Glaces a Blanc (Coloured Onions)

Demo 5:
Chicken Stock

Veal Stock

Bechamel Sauce and Sause Tomate

Cheese Lecture: On Wednesday night we had a cheese lecture. It was run by a man names Tom, (see below in background), i dont think you could meet a man more passionate and knowledgeable about cheese. He spent 3 hour with us, talking through all the different types of cheeses, processes, and off cause taste testing them all!!!

Demo 6:

Poulet roti au jus (roast chicken)

This would have to be my farovite practical so far, probably the only I have eaten and enjoyed! We were taught to truss the chicken, (still havent master that one!) and then cook and crave, serving it with glaces a brun (caramelised/browned baby onions), Broccoli and finished with a jus.

Trussing Chicken