Fi Fo Fum: August 2012

I cant believe the course is almost over! I have just loved it and it is sad its is all coming to an end!
Aplogise this post is a bit late, have been in Barcelona since Thursday (post to come on travels) ! We had a bank holiday today (monday) in London! So after arriving back early this morning, I'm now at home relaxing and getting ready for my last week of classes at Le Cordon Bleu!!
Practical 25: Dressed Crab and White Wine Mussels
The crab was an interesting dish, very old school french. Looks like a colourful smiley face, but this is how the chef wanted it! To make this we first were each given a whole crab that had been frozen the day previous. They had come into the Le Cordon Bleu kitchen a day earlier alive, In previous year students were given the crabs live, but after a few complaints from students and resistent to do it we had to have them frozen first by the prep kitchen at the school. Bit disappointing, would have been good experience and practice!
After cooking the crab in water for 15 min we then had to pull the crab apart, scooping out the brown meat and white meat. Once meat was removed from the crab including legs, the shell of the crab was put back into boiling water to clean it out. After this it was then dressed, first brown meat then chopped iceberg lettuce, followed by white meat. Then it was topped with chopped, Egg, Parsley, Tomato and Olives.

Not much to this dish very easy, just some mussels cooked in butter, parsley, garlic and white wine.

Practical 26: Fillet Steak with Béarnaise Sauce and Pomme Frites

Was so tasty!!

Practical 27: Beef Stroganoff served with vegetable and rice pilaf, julienne of beetroot and gherkin and a dollop of sour cream.

Practicing exam dish: Shopping!

I have been practicing my Chicken dish for exam, a trolley full of all the ingredients needed, including knife bag.

Next post adventures in Barcelona!

Apologises it has been awhile between posts. London and The Olympics have been a very busy time, been getting out and enjoying to atmosphere of London, which has been electric!
So Last week at Le Cordon Bleu was a big week of practicals, Including practicing 1 of tow possible exam dishes.

Deco 19: Fricassee De Poulet a la Creme de Champignons et Legumes Glaces: (Chicken Fricassee served with Glace Onions, Turned Potatoes and Mushroom Sause)

This dish is one of two possible dishes that we will be examined on for our final assessment. For the practical we ever given 3 hours to fully butcher and prepare the chicken and prepare other elements of the dish. When we do this in the exam in 3 weeks time we are not given a recipe and we are only given two hours!!! We will to start doing a lot of practicing!! The process of turning 3 potatoes to create 12 perfectly shaped potatoes is a fine art and takes 20 mins on its own. Will have to start spending days cutting and perfecting the art of turned potatoes!

Kitchen set up before practical

Demo 20: Poussin

Still looking at birds but slightly smaller varieties! The dish we made was a Poussin served with a Mustard and Tarragon reduction (with cream of course!), Apple sauces and Potatoes that were boiled and then dressed with butter.

Demo 21: Livers and Sweetbreads!

This was probably one practical that I would have to say i would never cook again!

The taste and smell of both Calf Liver and Sweetbread was very strong and I throught it was almost unpalatable. In saying that there were many people in the class who loved them aswell as the chef who enjoyed tasting everyone one of the 14 dishes served by each student!

Chef David taking the skin off the Calf Liver. In practical we were given small cuts of this large piece!

Demo Room

Full Calf Liver

Calfs Liver with a Caramelised Onion Sause and Sautee Potatoes

Veal Sweetbreads with Apragus, Parisienne Potatoes and top with Black truffle

One evening last week we also had to attend a wine lecture. Were we learning about the process of making wine and then had a wine tasting session. We learnt about tasting notes and flavours, and appropriate food pairings. In the tasting we tasted 3 white wines and 3 red wines, all european wines.

A turtle made out bread with sandwich inside. This was made by one of the superior students with an afternoon tea.

THIS WEEK

Demo 22:

Les Farces (Chicken Breast stuffed with Chicken mousse)

This was a dish that I really enjoyed doing. There was a lot of techniques involved in create the mousse and then stuffing, rolling and poaching the chicken, but the end result tasted great!

It was served with a courgette spaghetti and a tomato reduction. The process of creating the mousse was to combine chopped chicken breast with egg white and lots of sea salt. Blend in a robo cop (strong food processer that blend and chopped things very finely), only to a fine paste we then has to pass the content through a fine drum sieve.The holes on the sieve are so fine that it took about 20 mins to get all the content through! Only this was passed we then put it in the blast chillers to cool down quickly. Once chilled to then added chopped rosemary and thyme and became adding cream very slow to ensure it did not silt! Once it came to a moouse like consistently we then piped it in the a flattened chicken breast. We then rolled the breast up to form a long tube like shape. The cooking process was to wrap the chicken up and cooking it in simmering water till cooked through, then sliced and served!

Apple cutting chef did in one of the practicals

Demo 23: Exam Dish Number 2

This is the second of the possible exam dishes. Lemon Sole fillets in white wine and tomato sauce with pan-fried spinach and boiled turned potatoes. This dish is much the same in difficultly, again we were ask to fillet a whole fish and debone it. It was then served with the lovely turned potatoes and peeled cherry tomatos. The same problems applied for this dish took us all 3 hour and should of taken 2. So looks like i will be eating lemon sole and chicken for the next 3 weeks!

Demo 24: Filet de Truite Meuniere aux Amandes

Pan-Fried fillet of Trout with Almonds

Today we every given a whole ocean trout and had to fully fillet and debone the fish. It was then served with a beurre noisette of almonds and Pommes de terre l'anglaise (turned potatoes but slightly larger ones!)

I really enjoyed this dish it beautiful piece of fish and very fresh! Ate it at 11am this morning after plating it in the practical. Trout for morning tea!

We also had to make a Hollandaise Sauce in the practical but just presented it in the bowl, dont have a photo for you! So photo below is from the demo where the chef used it as a sause over brill steaks which was poached in milk. Doing by hand is definitely a work out full 5 min of content whisking!

So now you are all up to date with where i am at Le Cordon Bleu. Classes are now finished for the week 5 day weekend back there Monday for Crab dishes!

Olympics

I was lucky enough to go to two events at the olympics last wednesday night and thursday morning!

Womens Beach Volleyball Medel Matches

Bronze Match: Brazil VS China

Gold Medel: USA VS USA

Here are some photos from the night. It a great atmosphere and was in a temp stadium that was build in St James Parks, so an amazing location. the atmosphere was great lots of music and intervals of dancers and singing performance by MIKA.

Dancers in the change of ends

China VS Brasil

USA VS USA

MIKA

Olympic Theme Macrons in Restaurant in SOHO

Diving Semi Final Thursday 9th. The diving was great, really good to see two aussies progress to semi final and then one win silver that night! The dives were pretty incredible the stuff they do from a 10 m platform is spectacular! It was also great to see the olympic park and all the stadiums they have build out there! Aome are from my photo and some are from my camera so quality is varied sorry!