MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Make sure you eat something good today! :D

Survey says...

...nothing right now. I busted out a solid 88% on my final (crazy) Kitchen II practical, but it remains to be seen if I will finish the class with a 'B' or perhaps creep into 'A' range. Either is acceptable. Math is an 'A' for sure, so hopes of making the Dean's List again with a 3.5 GPA+ are high. More details tomorrow...

UPDATE: Another month down, 'A's across the board in my classes. The 4.0 GPA is alive and well... Bring on Proteins!

RECIPE -- Pasta Carbonara

This has been my favorite thing we've made in class thus far (if you couldn't tell from my gushing in the previous post when I first mentioned it), so I thought I'd finally take a few moments and post the recipe:

8oz Pancetta (sub. Bacon if you want)

10oz Onions, julienned

3oz White Wine

15oz Heavy Cream

Lightly brown the pancetta over low/medium heat until 3/4 cooked. If you want more texture from it, than crisp it up. I'd recommend the latter. Once you get the pancetta to the consistency you like, add the onions and saute them with the bacon until they're cooked through. The add the white wine, and reduce it 50%. That shouldn't take very long since the portion is small...maybe a minute tops. Add the heave cream and bring to a gentle simmer. DO NOT LET IT BOIL/BEGIN TO REDUCE! You want to preserve as much sauce as possible, trust me!

5oz Heavy Cream

2 egg yolks

This mixture is called a liaison, a finishing technique that brings a richness and shininess to a sauce. Mix the egg yolks and heavy cream together with a whisk, then place it in a big enough bowl to be able to add all of the sauce you have on the stove into it. You need a big bowl to be able to incorporate all of the sauce into the liaison. Do this by adding the hot sauce slowly into the liaison, maybe 1/4 or 1/3 of the total volume at at time, whisking all the while. This negates the eggs ability to cook (it heats evenly, slowly). Once everything is together, you're set to add it to your cooked pasta!

1 lb Cooked Spaghetti
4oz Fresh Parmesan (sub. pre-grated if you want)
2 T Italian Flatleaf Parsley, chopped (sub. parsley if you want)
Black Pepper to taste (I recommend a lot)

The sauce may seem a bit runny at first., but get it on the pasta and let it sit for a few minutes and it'll thicken up to a nice, creamy consistency. Sprinkle the Parmesan and Parsley on top (if you want more of either ingredient, I say go for it-- this is all to taste really). A popular finishing technique is covering the top of your pasta with black pepper. I mean A LOT of pepper, at least more than you think you would usually use, and here's why (story time!):

Apparently the sauce is indigenous to a region in Italy with a majority of it's population working in coal mines. The dish was inspired by the local workers and the generous use of pepper across the top of the dish is an homage to them (coal dust = pepper...get it?). Again, this is to YOUR taste, but I was shocked at the amount of pepper Chef had us put on...and how delicious the dish remained. It just works. If you can grind fresh pepper, obviously, use that. There's no substitute there.

Enjoy-- perfect "make for a date" food due to the classy, pleasing flavor, and that remaining wine has to be drank too. Looks great on a plate and reeks of effort, but it's simple...just the way I like it!

Where's the beef? Oh...right there.

Less than two weeks of class remain in my second month of classes at *the* PCI, and I have still yet to cut myself (for those of you I've kept in suspense since my last post...waaay too long ago). I have burned myself a few times though...whoops.

That's to be expected in soups, stocks and sauces, I suppose. You're swirling around boiling liquids, fussing with combinations of flour and hot fat that can reach 400 degrees plus. And it's amazing how quickly you forget a pan that was just in the oven is indeed still hot. You probably just judged me...but believe me-- when it's hectic, hot metal = hot just doesn't click in your mind sometimes.

Also, people who put dishes near the sinks to be washed while they are still scalding hot should be executed immediately. That's what got me once. FAIL!

Waaay late-- hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. Mine was enjoyable in the sense of getting up early for once to help my mom cook. I stuffed my first turkey! We went organic this year too and it was delicious. Other than that I did some miscellaneous chopping and took over the mashed potatoes. Next year will be a bit more epic, probably. There's only so much you can do with knife skills and a loose take on a few culinary basics.

School has been delicious as of late. We're onto brown sauces (namely espagnole sauce). Espagnole takes around an hour and a half to do properly, but is well worth the wait. The demi glace that can be reduced from it is pretty epic taste-wise as well. Some of the small sauces derived from espagnole sauce are tasty too...namely Diablo. Even simply reducing by 50% and adding a bit of wine (we used port) can really change the taste in an awesome way.

With the brown sauces comes beef. Roasts, flank steak, swiss steak...omnomnom. Breakfast continues to be my best meal of the day, for sure. We've done spaetzle, risotto and duchess potatoes on the side-- mmm...trust me. De-licious.

Grades through 25% of points in Kitchen has me at a 96%. I'll take it. The big week (worth like, 66% of my grade) full of practicals and the final is next week. That will be interesting. Other than that...Math is still Math. 2+2=4. 2+2=4. It's the Barney fun-time hour. I think we're up to multiplying/dividing fractions? Fifth grade...good times.

Pens are getting healthy, and they're still near the top of the Eastern Conference/NHL. My first chance to see them live is fast-approaching. Dec. 15, Pens/Flyers. Can't wait.

There's a ton of people in town this weekend. Should be a blast. I'll get back to you about that...soon. I mean it. Really. Not almost a month later. I will post on the blog. Honest.

OK, later on.