Sorry my personal food pics have been few and far between as of late. I'm not quite nerdy enough yet to shoot pics at work, and the my last Kitchens class at the LCB was in a faux restaurant setting (aka we were *busy* -- too busy to be snapping pics of every little dish at least).
The restaurant experience was an interesting one, albeit a bit abbreviated for myself. Due to my work schedule, I was assigned to the "prep shift" every morning for the 14-day cycle. This meant I prepped a lot of dish components and ingredients, but I wasn't up in the school's restaurant serving/cooking like everyone else. Others got to rotate through a variety of positions, from dishwasher to bartender, line cook to expediter, and so on...
This is another reason my pics from the experience are scarce-- I never really saw or delivered any finished products. Sure I had a grill full of ribs and similar items staring me in the face some mornings, but nothing plated and really worthy of snapping a photo of.
What you do see above are two amuse bouches I directly created for the daily menu, and a main feature dish that ran as a special for a day. I'm really happy with those products (pics could be better though) and would recreate them in a heartbeat for any food function.
The lettuce wraps should be tied with a "string" made of blanched scallion. The pic shows the dish with the strings omitted, as I didn't want to waste my limited supply on an example plate. Poke fun if you want, you cut strings of scallions. It's tedious...
Also, side note on the topic of amuse bouches-- the "classroom" teacher for the restaurant refers to them as "abuse mouches" (why she switches the letters I have *NO* idea). That comes out sounding like "abused mooses" or "a booze mooses."
Hey, I laughed.
So yeah...nine days of class remain between me and my externship. The translation there is "nine days remain between me and just having to go to work like a normal person."
Where has this year gone?
There comes a sad time in every man's life when he opens his refrigerator with a rumbly tummy and only sees the likes of condiments...butter...maybe a leftover tortilla shell or two.
"Well, what's in the pantry?" the man (who says pantry) might ask himself at this desperate time. Hmm...also nothing. He stares at an empty pizza box near the trash can and thinks of happier times. Sigh...Pizza Hut-- our time together was too short.
His stomach rumbles. Somewhere in the distance a wolf howls a long and worrisome note...
These are the times that the truly resourceful (or perhaps lazy) man can whip together a hodgepodge of ingredients to make a truly heroic meal. That...or maybe he just settles.
This is a story of the latter.
At 9pm a few weeks ago I arrived home after a long day of school and work-- tired and defeated. I was ready to hydrate, sit down and become a vegetable for a couple of hours before bed. But first I had to eat something...and the refrigerator offered no solace. Into the pantry I delved, refusing to settle for a measly protein bar or an improvised Sriracha and Worchestershire Sauce sandwich.
For probably the millionth time in my time here in Pittsburgh my eyes glossed past an unopened container of Bisquick without a second thought. In fact, I was in the middle of deciding if I could use the Italian Breadcrumbs I own in bulk to bread cloves of garlic when a little angel appeared on my left shoulder.
This angel took the shape of my best friend and former college cohort, Tim Baker. The flowing white robe, hair, golden aura around him...all very majestic. I leaned closer to him as he opened his mouth to no doubt impart words of wisdom to me in this time of need...and he said...
"Dude. Shugar. MAKE PANCAKES YA' DOUCHE! You only did it like EVERY OTHER DAY in college. C'mon!"
With that Angel Baker disappeared leaving me with one very important question-- did I actually, for once in this life, have milk AND eggs sitting around to make this venture possible?
Somehow I did. The stars had aligned! I had milk that wasn't four weeks old and eggs that had only been in the fridge for a week (not a month). With glee I broke into the Bisquick container and began mixing the ingredients in a giant mixing bowl. Aside, I heated up my griddle.
At this point I wasn't thinking clearly, either from my near-religious pancake experience, or perhaps from the exhaustion of the day. For some reason I didn't want to turn around, walk two feet and get a conveniently-located spoon out to portion out individual pancakes. That or maybe I didn't want to stand there for 15 minutes and make 10 small pancakes as only one or two could be made in my griddle at a time.
Instead I just poured the batter directly from the bowl to the griddle. What resulted was pancake batter everywhere...the pancake now cooking on the griddle was far from a perfect circle...my bowl started dripping everywhere (and everyone knows that hardened pancake batter = cement on counters). I had to make a decision, and for some reason I thought pouring all the batter in at once to make one HUGE pancake would be the easiest way to remedy Pancake-ageddon from happening.
I began pouring (*lightning flash*). The pancake took the shape of a perfect circle (*thunder clap*). My mixing bowl, now empty, was tossed haphazardly into the nearby sink.
The Pancake...it's...beautiful. Mwah HA HA HA! (*fists and arms raised into the air in defiance of the Bisquick Gods).
For two minutes I thought I could pull it off. The pancake was browning well...I could lift a quarter with a spatula and it was binding together. To be safe I grabbed a second spatula and prepared for the greatest flip in pancake history.
What followed was the worst flip in pancake history.
As I lifted with the two spatulas the pancake just disintegrated. In a panic I just started trying to flip broken pieces back into the spots they came from like some deranged, battery puzzle. But I'm only good at the border of puzzles and Grandma wasn't around to help me with the center this time.
In the end it somehow all worked out. None of the pancake burned. It cooked all the way through. I was left with pancake pieces convenient for dipping, and what I didn't finish of the pancake was kept in the fridge for a couple days, providing an improvised meal when needed.
And that's how I spent a night after work about a fortnight ago-- if this doesn't paint an accurate portrait of my life living alone in Pittsburgh...I don't know what does.
I bet Van Gogh's pancakes were misunderstood in his time too...
"Snails on a Log" -- A Mark Shugar original (name patent pending)
I mean I'm really proud of that PB/Celery...uhhh...Tian? I will admit the knife cuts are a little sloppy on the brunoise of celery and banana on the plate, but those "snails" on the "logs" look pretty banging...right? ...RIGHT!?
It's the first day of no school/no work since...Memorial Day? It's a lovely soon-to-be-rainy day in PIT, and Chris and Amy are stopping in for a visit. The apartment is clean...I'm postponing a haircut until I get home and can see my regular heading into a month full of weddings...uhh...
Yeah...that's all I got. Posts will be sporadic until school kicks back in next Tuesday, but it doesn't mean you shouldn't keep an eye out for random food porn or a tale of shenanigans.
SUMMER BREAK! WOOOOOOOOoooooooooooooo!
Well, the last food cycle came to a close today in Contemporary Cuisine with a sugarless bang (aka a diabetic menu). Considering this is America, where we slurp 64oz sodas because "It's only .25 more to supersize," chances are good you know a diabetic (or six).
I have a few friends that are diabetic, so I sort of approached this menu with the idea in my head that I was catering exclusively to those friends. Again, there's a joy in having the ability and knowledge to stuff your diabetic friend's face with a "sugary" treat without...you know...putting them into a coma or a position they might have their foot amputated.
*cough*
So our typical Chef has been out of town this week in Ottawa, Canada, consulting or doing whatever Chefs well established in their careers get to do (i.e. travel, get money/get paid, talk about food, eat food, etc.). Therefore, our Chef from Breads and Pastries is running the course currently, and he has really encouraged us to 'play with the food' some and put our stamp on the menu items.
The Salmon, "BLT" with Chipotle Mayo is how one girl in the class did just that. Leftover crust pieces of the bread not used making croutons became platforms for some of the salmon we made, mixed with the standard BLT fixings. Mix up a chipotle mayo and serve it "slider" style-- delcious.
What I brought to the table was the Boursin Crostini. I mean I like croutons as much as the next guy, but let's go to the next level here. I will admit the dish is a bit Omni-inspired, but I made it completely different in class than how I make it at work.
And just how do I make it you ask?
Well, I used a cutter to make the bread into discs instead of squares or sticks (boring!), which I then brushed with a garlic-infused olive oil and sprinkled salt and pepper on before crisping them up in the oven. Aside I mixed Boursin cheese (the 'ranch dressing of cheeses' if you ask me) and cream cheese in a KitchenAid.
Pipe the cheese mixture onto the crostini, garnish with crushed pink peppercorns and chives-- serve. I promise you it's tasty. You would dip vegetables or bread in the cheese mixture all day if I'd let you...and I would let you (I'm a nice guy like that!).
Anyway, I was inspired by the Tomato Avocado Tian...at least in recreating the disc shape with my crostini. I wanted my crostini to mirror the Tian on the salad plate but provide a different texture profile. I think i accomplished that.
Side note-- mozzarella, guacamole and a seasoned, roasted tomato slice. Serve me those delicious hockey pucks of joy every day of the week, please. Sooo good!
Chef liked my plate...aside from my ever-spreading oil spill on the left side. For about 22 seconds my plate looked bomb...then the oil went all BP on me. Argh! So frustrating. Everyone had the same problem though, the oil just melted all over the plate whereas the Balsamic held shape.
Oh well, lesson learned-- less oil next time.
Pictures don't do the Tomato Consomme much justice. It's supposed to be strained of tomato pulp a bit better too (the final appearance should be clear, actually-- you should be able to see to the bottom and garnishes with ease). It tasted OK though-- a very intense tomato flavor...and I love tomatoes.
Floating in the Consomme is the Celestine Garnish...which is a fancy way of saying sliced up, herbed crepes. I've never seen a crepe used as a garnish, but it worked. Essentially you have all the herby tastes you would want in that soup in the crepe pieces...so the overall effect is a very crisp tomato soup flavor profile. Different...and different is usually good (or at least interesting).
The whole salmon dish was OK, sure, but I didn't t
hink it broke down any wowie-walls in my ever-budding culinary mind. The piece of fish was a piece of fish (I like the use of cumin with fish). The cous cous with roasted vegetables was tasty...but it's essentially "pasta" with vegetables. I could take it or leave it...
Now the main event of the diabetic menu was the Scone Shortcake, which was a typical scone recipe with the sugar replaced with Splenda. You can replace sugar cup for cup when baking with Splenda, and honestly I have no idea why you would use any other sugar substitute. Equal and others all have terrible aftertastes-- Splenda tastes the most like sugar, by far.
And again, easy to use. One cup sugar = one cup Splenda. I like simple.
The whipped cream was nothing more than heavy cream and Splenda, and the Berry Topping just pureed strawberries, strained and sweetened up some with (gasp!) Splenda. Very fresh, very clean...very simple(!) strawberry shortcake that diabetics can enjoy. Win.
OK, I'm out for now to enjoy some of my day off from work. Check back in when you can to hear how my kitchen practical prep/execution goes down, and remember...when it comes to food blogs...
THERE'S NO SUBSTITUTE FOR SHUGAR! (*vomits cliches and cheesiness all over laptop*)
Chances are you know someone who is rocking a gluten-free diet. Either gluten causes them mild GI discomfort, or maybe it's even elevated to the point of Celiac Disease.
Either way, as a chef it's important for us to be able to cater to the different dietary needs and restrictions of our patrons. I find joy in cooking foods with these restrictions that actually taste good (i.e. vegetarian meals where you don't miss meat). Gluten-free certainly doesn't have to mean taste-free...it's the year 2010. We humans are smart. We've figured it all out, right?
Well in this case, absolutely. Cookies made without flour? Check. Corn BREAD that's gluten free? Yep. Gluten-free noodles? Done.
But does it taste good?
Let me say that the chocolate chip cookies we had Friday had to be some of the best I have ever had. It's so good, in fact, that I will post the recipe for you gluten-less peeps when I find myself free from work for a day. Even if you can handle gluten, you might want to check it out.
The corn bread improved drastically from Friday to today. There was some tweaking of the recipe --less salt here, a pinch more sugar there-- and it was really quite tasty. I think it would be better with a heavier hand of Cheddar cheese and some minced jalapeno in the mix, but that's me. It was certainly still a moist, tasty version of corn bread that can be enjoyed by all regardless of gluten tolerance.
The Mussels Mariniere was delicious. I love mussels...and it's amazing how simple ingredients like tomato, wine, garlic, green onions and butter can really take them to a whole new level. Give me a spoon and 20 mussels and I will show you a satisfied Mark Shugar.
Homemade gluten-free noodles served as the sauce mopping bed of tastiness for the mussels to rest on. Making the pasta from scratch was a near-identical process to making normal noodles, the trick is just figuring out how to substitute traditional flours.
In this case, we worked with items such as tapioca flour, cornstarch, potato starch, Xanthan gum, rice flour, corn meal and gluten-free baking powder to sub for typical all-purpose flours. It's a few extra steps, sure, and you have to find the right aisle at the supermarket to collect these ingredients, but to give someone who can't eat gluten say...bread? I mean that's a win.
I will post up our recipe for gluten-free flour when I get a chance too.
The beef dish was pretty typical. Rice noodles and gluten-friendly soy sauces were the only major changes to make the dish gluten-free. Aside from that it really didn't incorporate components that relied heavily on gluten. Meat and vegetables work for everyone.
OK, we're on to diabetic food next. Only eight days of class remain before I get a week and a half or so off school. Now if I can only get that time off of work too...hmm...
Check back for recipes! Later on...
If you already know what Umami is I want you to write in the comments of this blog post that you're a big smarty pants, then give yourself a hefty pat on the back. I for one was absolutely clueless the word existed until arriving at school, and even then it took a couple of months.
The long and the short of it for you who don't feel like clicking the link above is Umami is a basic taste that can be picked up on the tongue. I'm guessing most of you are like me and grew up on the bitter, salty, sweet, sour basics of taste...but apparently the Japanese have recognized Umami (aka savory) since 1908.
Amino acids are the key. They house glutamic acids which, apparently, have unique but consistent flavor profiles. The guy who discovered Umami figured out that foods like meat, cheese, mushrooms and other protein-heavy foods are high in these glutamic acids, and different combinations of these acids can produce a different basic taste sensation on the tongue.
Hence Umami was born, and the poor kids in Mr. Honkers fifth grade Biology class now have to learn a Japanese word that's a bit more difficult to spell than say...sweet, or sour.
So the focus in this cycle of food in Contemporary Cuisine is the Umami flavor profiles. I'm OK with that because meat, mushrooms and cheese happen to be frequent visitors to my stomach.
The pasta dish was refreshing...which I guess is how one would describe a pasta dish that sauce is absent from. It was literally as the title reads-- shrimp, asparagus, prosciutto and pasta.Clean flavors, but I wanted to add some cream and reduce it down for some kind of binding sauce.
As Chef was quick to point out though, the cream would dull some of those flavors in the dish, thus making the whole idea of preparing an Umami meal a fruitless effort.
Touché.
In order for a dish like the Mushroom Parmentier to carry the moniker "Parmentier" it has to involve potatoes in some way. Antoine-Augustin Parmentier, and physician in Napoleon's army, was one of the first vocal advocates of eating potatoes instead of just feeding it to animals as their primary food source.
Hey, I like potatoes-- nice job, man. You deserve the right to have dishes named after you.
As you can see, it's a casserole-esque dish. Layer of potato, layer of sauteed and flavorful mushrooms, layer of potato, top with cheese and parsley, bake -- serve. It's delicious.
What makes the ketchup on the "Bomb" Burgers Umami is the addition of traditional Asian ingredients like anchovies and fish sauce. At the end of the day it's a really flavorful (homemade!) ketchup, and it went very well on the fries and the burgers.
The burgers were simply ground chuck, minced garlic, fish sauce, some fresh ground pepper, salt and a little bit of sugar. They were garnished with traditional fixin's such as onion, tomatoes and lettuce (or in this case, micro greens).
Honestly the burger wasn't the star. I've made better burgers (as simple as my version of a bacon burger...topped with caramelized onions...a good piece of provolone che-- OK WOW! I'm making one of those this week. I just talked myself into that. SO GOOD!).
But the buns...the buns would take any burger to the next level. I don't know 100 percent what was all on the "Everything Buns," but I will make a mental note tomorrow when I make the burger and stop back in to pass it onto you, the loving masses. So tasty!
Oh, and the fries-- your typical fry cut topped with fresh grated Parmesan cheese, parsley and some truffle oil when they came out of the fryer.
The interesting side note with the fries is the simple matter of making tasty fries. Those in the know should know that you blanch the potatoes (which have been tossed in corn starch) in a low temperature...say 300-325 degrees...until they turn a light brown. You then line them up on a sheet tray and refrigerate them for a while before returning them to the fryer, this time at a toasty 375 degrees.
As Chef explained today-- when you blanch the potatoes they shrink a little bit. The cornstarch "layer" maintains its original shape, however, supported by small "branches" of starch from the potato. When you fry the fries the second time, that outer, starch/cornstarch layer becomes super crispy, as opposed to soggy and unimpressive.
Think Burger King fries vs. McDonald's fries...if that makes it easier. Burger King obviously coats their fries with some type of starch to achieves that unique crispy outer layer.
You learn something new everyday.
The super new thing for me today came when I was (again!) deveining shrimp. You devein the intestine from the top of the shrimp because no one wants to be chomping on what we colorfully call "the poop vein" in the kitchen. You can usually see the grayish poop vein through the opaque shrimp flesh after the shrimp is peeled.
Well today I saw what I suspected was an ENORMOUS poop vein, easily 4-5 times the size of one I've ever seen. I showed it to Chef and his response was, "Cut that out, set it aside and call me back over... ...you and I are going to eat it."
"Uhh...wait...what?"
Chef cooked the suspected poop vein up in a little bit of water on a spoon over a burner, and it quickly turned pink. That's right-- shrimp eggs...not the intestinal tract. We both ate half and, low and behold, it tasted INTENSELY of shrimp. Think of the most flavorful shrimp you've ever had, this had an even more...well...shrimpy...taste. Delicious.
Shrimp eggs-- cross it of the "Things I Thought I'd Never Eat" list.
Whew. What a book. And now I have to go to work. Hope you enjoyed...
Delicious and interesting-- Contemporary Cuisine continues to fascinate me on a daily basis. A lot has to do with what we're making (or how we're making it) and some with Chef's almost encyclopedia-esque knowledge of product he's passing along to us.
Case and point-- Micro Greens. Apparently there's an amazing place to get Micro Greens (and herbs) in Sandusky, Ohio. We're talking 15 minutes or so away from Cedar Point. I forsee a stop sometime during the Toledo to Pittsburgh commute.
So why Micro Greens? Well, they're pretty to look at and the flavor is concentrated. I'd say that's a pair of wins for what you're looking for with your food. I hear they're pricey though...
Anyway-- the food. This is the last of the food we will be rocking using the sous-vide technique. So why not finish with pork...the other white meat (which I honestly prefer a bit pink in the center anymore. Pink pork is A-OK people...trust me).
The Spiced Pork Shoulder was like eating a giant hunk of perfectly cooked rib meat. I mean this dish makes ribs obsolete. They're always frustrating. "Mmm...meat...and bone." Repeat, repeat, repeat. When you're done eating, half of what you ordered is still on the plate-- inedible bone matter.
And yet I still love ribs. OmNomnomnom...
Fava Succotash (Succotash being a fancy word for 'creamed <
Now Pork Tenderloin...I love it. Screw ham around the holidays, give me the pork. This only had butter, salt and pepper and it was *far, far and away* the best I've ever had. Obviously the sous-vide method of cooking is why-- the pork was PERFECTLY cooked, juicy...SO GOOD!
And the Honey-Thyme Gastrique...yowza. The sweet tang is great with the pork, of course, and I'm sure it would taste good on just about anything. A giant tub of filled with it would probably be hard to not want to bathe in... ...is it weird I just said that?
Not much to talk about with the Cauliflower Silk (*cough* Puree *cough*) or Tourned Carrots. Tourne describes the cut of the carrot --a five-sided football shape-- and it's really, really, really a pain in the ass to do right. Carrots don't help either...they're so irregular they make even the simplest cuts difficult.
Polenta is so hit and miss for me. I really think it is just flavorless filler-- it really never impresses me when it stands alone. But then you melt cheese all over it...
You win, cheese. You always win.
LIQUID PORT SPHERES! I saved the best for last, of course. They're made the same way as the Wasabi Caviar I've raved about in the past couple of posts, only the flavored solution is added to the Calcium Chloride "bath" with a half teaspoon instead of a eye dropper.
The difference that comes with the size is that the liquid is encapsulated inside of the skin that forms when the two liquids come into contact. This means you can either eat them and have them burst open in your mouth (flavor a'hoy!), or you can break them on the plate and rub your food around in it pre-munching time.
Again...pretty much Port-flavored Gushers. Man, food is fun!
OK, that's enough for now. Enjoy your weekends!
I just wanted to toss a few supplemental pics up real quick-- one to give you a better sense of the Wasabi Caviar, another to what the Miso dish would look like when served to you in a restaurant (the Mushroom Brodo would be added table side by your server). That pic of the Miso looks a lot better than the brown pool pic I produced last post.
The pic of the Seafood Sausage is just my plate presentation on Day 2 for the dish. The chef actually complimented it (albeit just for the spacing), but praise is tough to come by in this class.
Finally, people wanted a better idea what a slice of the Enchilada Lasagna I made looked like. That's the last known picture of the last piece of it before it mysteriously disappeared. Hmm...
OK, new food post on the way...either tonight or tomorrow morning. It involves more super-cool, sciency food cooking so you know you want to check back!
What better way to spend my first day off from both work AND school in the last few weeks --yay, Memorial Day(!)-- than by spending it outside at the Pittsburgh Zoo. The pics are pretty self-explanatory, a zoo is a zoo is a zoo, but here's some side notes...
The PITT Zoo is about a 15-minute drive from where I live...complicated only by large amounts of construction on the quickest route. Parking is free, tickets were only $15, and the zoo is very leafy/pretty despite its hilly layout. I mean you have to take a 3-minute escalator ride from the parking lot up to the main area from the parking lot-- that kind of hilly.
All in all I enjoyed the experience. There was a lot of "The Cleveland Zoo does this..." and "The Toledo Zoo does this..." between Molly and myself, respectively, but every zoo has something unique and interesting to it. That's why I always like to check out the zoo when I'm traveling and in big cities...there's always something fun for everyone that's new and exciting.
My favorite pic is by far is the "hobo" Gorilla. Dude was munching oranges or something out of a cardboard box, but the way he was leaned against the giant rock made it comical. That or the stare at the crowd that easily translated into, "Whatchu' looking at meatbags?"
I found humor in the "Mario Lemieux" marker on the 'Are you as tall as our elephants?' measure near the elephant exhibit. Another Pens fan and myself agreed that their marker has to be Lemieux on skates. He's a large man...but then again so am I. Like most player stats, I think the zoo officials were being pretty generous.
Molly the Camel amused me because Molly had made it known earlier in the day that Molly isn't a common name (I argue this-- I seem to meet Molly's everywhere). Well, sometimes you eat your words because a camel proves you wrong.
Look for that expression in a fortune cookie in the near future.
All I have left to say is it was cool how the PITT Zoo has a few exhibits where there is really nothing between you and the animal. The Kangaroo, Peacock and Hornbill are literally meandering the same paths as you. Very interesting.
Another PITT experience down-- count it!
The crazy-awesomeness continued in Contemporary Cuisine today. Between the dishes, specifically the Wasabi Caviar, I've got a lot to cover here...
Seafood Sausage was a highlight of Catering and Buffet. I actually found it to be the tastiest sausage we made in that class. It should come as no surprise then that the Seafood Sausage we made today scored high on the delicious scale for me again.
A half of a pound of scallops is added to a half pound of lean fish, ground together and seasoned with salt and such. You then add heavy cream, bread crumbs and egg whites to pull it all together ("forcemeat"). On the side you small dice some salmon and slice up some parsley and chives ("garnishes"). You mix the forcemeat and garnishes in a bowl, then put it in a pastry bag.
Now the interesting part. You pipe the meat mixture onto a flat piece of Saran wrap. We then laid halved pieces of shrimp about an eighth of an inch apart on top of the piped mixture. You roll up the Saran wrap into a sausage shape, tie it off, then it's off to the "hot tub" with it. The protein sets, you remove the wrap...and eat, eat, eat. It's sooo good.
What makes the Seafood Sausage a Persillade is the combo of herbs, seasonings and bread crumbs sprinkled on top when it was finished. Maybe you've have pork in the style of Persillade...that's popular.
I thought the Creamed Leek and Fennel was tasty (most people aren't huge fans of either...I'm an emerging fan of both). The Israeli Cous Cous tasted like pasta salad...but how it was presented with the Carrot Ribbon wrapped around it is pretty cool...to me at least. Fried Leek is Fried Leek. More for show than anything.
The Miso-Mushroom Brodo is a very earthy broth and great liquid for the Glass Noodles to swim around in. You pretty much simmer a wide variety of Asian ingredients in water for 15-20 minutes to allow the broth to take flavor. Season it up with some Soy Sauce and Miso Paste and you're golden.
Sous Vide Salmon is, of course, perfectly cooked. When you've eaten all of these products cooked in traditional fashions (poached, grilled, sauteed, etc), it's kind of mind-blowing to eat it in what is considered to be its "perfect texture." No matter to me though-- I love salmon in any form.
So let's talk Wasabi Caviar...
First two separate liquids are prepared. One is simply a small amount of Calcium Chloride (yep, road salt) dissolved in water. The other is your flavored liquid-- in this case Wasabi. We mixed Wasabi Powder in water, then added Alginate to it. You pulse this mixture with an immersion blender and then cook it to a simmer on the stove. Allow that to cool and it's action time.
The chef has this crazy device called a Vaccu-Pette. You place your flavored liquid in the pan, then place the "lid" of pipettes into the pan. Pull up the plunger to absorb up some liquid, then take it over to your Calcium Chloride/water mixture. Push the plunger back out and little drops of your flavored liquid fall out.
When the Calcium Chloride reacts with the Alginate...a "skin" is created, pretty much instantly, encapsulating the flavored liquid of your choice in a cool little sphere. What you're left with it little spheres that kind of feel like cooked pasta in your hands...but when you bite into them-- BOOM! Wasabi!
IT. IS. AWESOME!
I talked with Chef aside a bit later in the kitchen about the process. He brought up that he thinks this could be huge for Mixology in the future if people really play with the science here. The example he cited to me was of how he and another Chef spent a weekend making Coke spheres and then trying to suspend them in rum.
Picture that-- a rum and Coke that is essentially Coke spheres floating in the alcohol that will burst and provide the desired flavor. How crazy is that?
The Science nerd inside me is pretty pumped about this stuff, in case you can't tell. If you find this as interesting as I do, Chef pointed me in the direction of this Web site. Check it out!
OK, done with this post-- check back soon for the PITT Zoo post...
As if Contemporary Cuisine hasn't been interesting enough, the last couple of days have been dedicated to sous-vide cooking. I will let the link speak in detail for me about the process, but we're essentially vacuum-compressing food in bags and cooking it submerged in water at very regulated temperatures.
IT IS AWESOME!
We're one of the few Cordon Bleu schools that have access to the equipment to do this cooking technique (the setup we're using costs upwards of $6000). And the things you can do with this equipment...well...you could cook a piece of beef perfectly but have it look like it's completely raw. I know that seems far from applicable in a usual restaurant...but hopefully you get the idea of what is possible with this technology. You can play with your food...so to speak.
Anyway...we threw all kinds of vacuum-sealed bags of vegetables into perfectly-regulated, 185-degree water to cook (mushrooms, cherry tomatoes, celery, fennel, etc).
What's awesome is you just throw whatever flavors you want in those vegetables right in the bag. You want butter? Toss in butter! You want to herb-infuse those tomatoes? Put basil in that bag! Want to pickle something, but you only have 20 minutes? A little of your favorite vinegar in the bag, toss it in the "hot tub," and you're golden.
HOW COOL IS THAT!? (**flails arms in excitement**)
And that's just vegetables! Let's talk meat...
Chef put an entire Brisket in a bag and cooked it at a constant 131 degrees for almost 24 hours. We then took that brisket, cubed it and seared it off to give it the appearance we wanted on the plate. You could cut that brisket with a PLASTIC SPOON! I mean, just ridiculous!
Another plus-- there's no juice lost in this cooking process. Anything that seeps out of the meat in the cooking process is poured right out of the bag into whatever sauce you're making. You think you've had a good brown sauce...then you have one with all the flavors from a sous-vide bag. Yowza.
The Herbed (thyme and rosemary) Sirloin was one of the better steaks I've ever had...at least until I had some of the coffee-encrusted variant (that involved cheese and cocoa...tasty I promise) a classmate got to make today. Man that was good.
Again-- you can cut this steak with a PLASTIC SPOON! If you've had a steak like that...you let me know where ASAP. Just amazing plates of food.
Tomorrow we start using seafood with this technique so be sure to check back. I've got the PITT Zoo post to do sometime here too...
Pittsburgh can be a pretty city...when it's not cloudy and raining. But good luck with that.
I wanted to give people a better idea of the area surrounding work so I snapped this pic while on my break Sunday. This is the park across the street from the hotel (aka where I sit and unwind during breaks...if I get one). I know I've heard the church in the photo was in a movie (I want to say 'Ghostbusters'), but I'm not 100 percent on that.
The theme of the weekend at work was again Kosher, Kosher, Kosher. This time there were two events, a mid-sized one on Saturday and then a wedding on Sunday night. Both were new and exciting in different ways.
Saturday Kosher events pose an interesting problem in the kitchen because Jewish people are not allowed to eat food prepared on Saturdays (or more specifically, sundown Friday to sundown Saturday). That's their Sabbath (Shabbat), in case you didn't know. Because of that, it meant a hellacious amount of prep and cooking Friday night by us to prepare for the event the next day.
The wedding was extensive Sunday and was a lot of work-- reception finger foods, salads, entrees, desserts, etc. And dinner wasn't until 9:30pm...makes for a long day. Considering how much Kosher I've done in the past two weeks, I half feel Jewish at this point.
Interesting side note-- when I was sitting at the park on a break with the woman training me on Saturday she filled me in a bit on what puts the grand in this grand hotel I'm working at:
When the G20 was going on this past year Obama stayed there, and yes, our kitchen made him food (an egg white omelet for him, just a halved grapefruit for the First Lady). The representatives from Russia, England and India also stayed. ... Apparently a couple of movies have filmed scenes in the hotel (most notably 'Silence of the Lambs' -- which I need to see now). ... The Steelers stay at the hotel the night before every home game. They actually enter the building via the same doors as me! This explains the numerous Steelers decals on the walls and two elevators. And yes...we cook for them (and no, Browns fans, I don't accept bribes)...
This really made me sit back and think a bit the next day when I was sitting in the park alone and snapped that pic above. Here I am working at a four-star hotel in downtown Pittsburgh. When I look up all I see is buildings, most belonging to some of the most powerful companies in the country. I can watch people enter and exit the 'T' (subway) and the constant and bustle around me.
Not to be all sappy...but how the hell did this happen? This was far from my dream when I was little. Hell, it wasn't my dream five years ago. I wish I could thank a few people who really turned me onto the idea of big city living-- it's just awesome.
I love being in the middle of it all. I really like that I'm putting my time in now for this job. I see good things at the hotel, and in this city, in my future. I've never felt so at home...well...away from home. It's a feeling you don't prepare for...it just happens.
Whew...OK, that was a bit much for a blog post. Let's take a peek at this:
Fish. Sweet, merciful, fish. Again, I have no issues with vegetarian cuisine, but it's not the most exciting food to eat...or cook. Protein of the "once-breathing" variety requires some more finesse, it's a better medium for flavor...and...well...IT'S MEAT!
As I mentioned in my previous food post, today was pesco-vegetarian...for those hippies in the world that may not eat Bambi but are A-OK chowing down on Nemo. Our dishes focused on salmon (an emerging favorite food of mine) and skate. I must say-- skate is one ugly fish.
Both dishes were tasty. The salmon was your standard panko-breaded piece of fish, but it was seasoned with a mixture of minced Cilantro, Nori Seaweed and Lemon Zest. That's a weird combo at first glance, but it provides a great citrus, salty flavor-- perfect for fish.
The tofu stuffed in the center turned a lot of people off, but I honestly didn't mind it. Then again, I don't mind the texture of tofu, and in this case I felt it gave each bite some substance.
The fun thing about this class is the playful way to approaching starches and vegetables on the plate. This isn't just put cauliflower next to the fish...let's make a puree out of it. I've never had such flavorful cauliflower...it almost tasted like mashed potatoes (if *that* makes sense). As for the Curry Emulsion...I could take or leave it. It was sweet with a spicy bite at the end, a very interesting and tasty combo, but a little went a long way.
If you don't roast tomatoes...you're missing out. Just put some salt, pepper and oil on them and stick them in an oven to slow roast at say, 300 degrees. If you really want to rock it add things like red wine vinegar and some of your favorite herbs to the marinade-- so good!
Fingerling Potatoes-- fun to say, fun to eat.
I really enjoyed the Shallot Encrusted Skate. I'm used to eating a lot of flat fish when I reach out to cook fish at home, but skate was never one that grabbed my attention. It's got a good, natural fishy taste to it without being too overwhelming.
So the original recipe for the dish called for the skate to be encrusted in onion, but the Chef said that could be a bit intense. This is where shallots save the day. They taste better (to me) anyway. What you're left with is a nice balance of crunchy and soft. Think the texture people love fish sticks for but with high-end products.
The vinaigrette Incorporated champagne vinegar, salad and truffle oils, minced herbs, some salt and pepper, and red tobbiko caviar. We also got to bust out the "chemistry set" with this one and use lecithin (powder) and xantham gum to mess with consistencies and properties of the vinaigrette. I'll leave you to the Wiki pages to read up on those a bit more-- I don't feel like explaining.
LESS THAN A WEEK LEFT TO VOTE ON THE BLOG MASCOT NAME (poll, to the right). OmNom holds a slim lead-- if that's not OK with you the time to act is now!
OK, enough for now...it's my day off from The Omni. Time to relax...
We finally move on to pesco-vegetarian food tomorrow (which allows the use of seafood), but for today it was one more meatless romp in Contemporary Cuisine.
I could take or leave the Green Lentil Chili. There was nothing in the Chili aside from lentils and sauce-- far from the variety I like and expect from the typical Chili. Plus, no matter how cooked and soaked in the sauce the lentils were...they're dry and kinda' bland. Good for you, sure, but bland.
The Vegetarian Chili, however, was amazing. I made mention of this exact recipe when I did the Enthusiast Course at school around Cinco de Mayo because it was made in that class. There's nothing else to say other than IT IS AMAZING! This is forever more my go-to recipe starter for any Chili I will make in the future (recipe to be posted soon).
And yes...I will put meat in it to take it to an even tastier level.
OK, that's it for now. VOTE TO NAME THE FOOD MASCOT! The poll is still located to the right. Also-- go Blackhawks...and the 'Lost' finale...well...yawn. Not going to miss that show...
This was my fuel for the weekend. We catered a local prom on Friday at The Omni and put out around 400 plates of lasagna. First of all, who wants lasagna at prom? It seems like a potential mess waiting to happen, but maybe that's just me. Second, when your favorite food is lasagna the last thing you want is to only be able to stare at it and plate it up a few hundred times. After about five minutes of that you want to gorge on every last scrap of noodle you see, trust me.
So, no surprise, after work I was off to GEagle to get ingredients to satisfy my lasagna fix.
Anyway, I know I've posted a pic of homemade lasagna on here before (what can I say, when I do cook at home I cook food I crave). This go-around I went with a sweet Italian sausage instead of ground beef, and I used fresh mozzarella instead of shredded or sliced processed versions. I'd say the changes made a difference --great ingredients usually do-- and overall I enjoyed this pan start to finish between Friday and today.
I just snapped this pic on the way to work on Sunday. You have to love Pittsburgh in the spring! I mean just look at that beautiful downtown skyline!
Anyway, Sunday was different for a lot of reasons at The Omni. We didn't cook out of the usual kitchen on the lower floor for starters. Instead we packed up all the food we would be using for the day and made a few trips tightly crammed into service elevators to a kitchen on the 17th floor.
The reason for the change of location was that the banquet we were putting food out for happened to be Kosher. This meant using tools and pans that were caged away in the 17th floor kitchen that have only been used in the past for these Kosher events. The few pans we used that had seen pork, shellfish or a dairy product in their lifetime had to be covered in Saran wrap.
(Note-- this was somewhat super annoying because we were not allowed to use our personal knives. The "Kosher" knives were just terrible-- just duller than dull. Try butterflying a chicken breast sometime with a dull knife...ugh).
Also interesting was that the Rabbi in the kitchen for the event had to check our preparation and cleaning of any vegetables used in the meal (bugs are also off the menu on Kosher menus...but I think that one is pretty universal), and he also had to turn on all the ovens, burners, steamers, etc. I don't quite know why, to be honest, but I just know it had to be done.
Let me now make note of one of the greatest things I have ever seen-- a Rabbi...with a flamethrower.
Let's just let that sink in for another second.
Yes, I have seen it-- a Rabbi with a flamethrower. Since it's probably impossible for The Omni to reserve a huge collection of serving vessels and tools just for Kosher events, items that had seen non-Kosher food items in their day were...well...cleansed? And by cleansed I mean the Rabbi walked around with a propane tank attached to a line which was attached to a nozzle. When he fired that bad boy up a nice foot or so of flame would shoot out and "purify" whatever needed a Kosher do over.
A Rabbi with a flamethrower...never thought I'd see that in this lifetime.
One other nice note about the 17th floor kitchen was the view. The kitchen downstairs is windowless, so when you are able to look up after plating almost 400 salads and see this:
Score.
There's still time to vote in the NAME THE MASCOT CONTEST. The poll is still located to the right, and there's still time to make your voice heard!
Nothing draws more groans from the majority of the class than when vegetarian and vegan food appears on the recipe rotation at school. I've never been one to get down on eating a plate of veges or soy products --as long as it tastes good-- so I was pretty excited to see how the pair of dishes we worked on today would turn out.
The focus in this class is quality over quantity, namely plate design over creating a buffet of food each day. To that I say...FINALLY! It's time to make stuff pretty as well as taste good. That's why I decided to attend this school in the first place-- to create dishes a motivated home cook can't produce with a recipe and a couple episodes of 'Good Eats' under their belt.
The dish our group was responsible for today (we will switch tomorrow) was the Crepes. The Crepes themselves use chicpea flour and can be tweaked with herbs of your choosing for both flavor and appearance.
As for the Tofu filling-- just herbs, garlic, lemon juice and salt. Nothing crazy, I know, but it's certainly more entertaining on the pallet than plain Tofu. We also put some of the roasted vegetables in the Crepes (Shiitake Mushrooms, Asparagus, Scallions, Red Pepper, Red Onion) in addition to using them as a garnish.
Now the carrots is what makes this dish all fancy and interesting, at least in my eyes. We have the carrot sauce (Shallots, Thyme, Lemon Juice and Carrot Juice, reduced down and garnished with Parsley). Then there was the Carrot Foam (fell free to call it 'Bubbles' or 'Air' if you prefer), which is nothing more than Carrot Juice hit with an immersion blender to incorporate air. And finally, the Carrot Powder. You take the leftover pulp from the carrots you juice, roll it flat on a sheet tray and bake until the carrot pulp dries out. Crumble and use as a garnish.
All in all-- the dish was good but nothing spectacular. It tasted like the stereotypical vegetarian and or vegan food many people scorn (i.e. it would taste better with meat involved somehow).
The other half of the class produced the tastier dish of the two in my opinion. The Soy Brown Sauce was held perfectly by the homemade Wheat Noodles. It also blended well with the Seitan, which is nothing more than a pound of all purpose flour and wheat flour kneaded into a firm ball and soaked under cold water for five minutes or so to allow the starch to rinse out of the dough. You repeat that step a few times and are left with a gelatinous, starch free(ish) ball of dough, which we cooked off in a vegetable and herb poaching liquid.
Add the vegetables for a bit of color and crunch-- no complaints there. I enjoyed a small bowl of it, but I must admit was kinda' sick of it by the near end. The sauce was tasty...and your mind starts to wonder how it might taste on a hunk of chicken or something. Sigh...oh well.
OK, that's it for now. I have about 10 minutes to shower and hustle over to The Omni for Day 2 of work. Day 1 kicked my butt...and I'm sure it's going to be more of the same from now until Saturday (40 hours in the first week-- mixed blessing of the century when you're up at 5:30am everyday).
VOTE ON THE MEAT MASCOT IF YOU HAVEN'T ALREADY!
I won't go too much into the details of the finale of Cuisine Across Cultures food. If you have ever been to a family reunion, you have probably ate at least of version of food we prepared today. I must say though, it probably wasn't as tasty as this.
Notes of interest: the base flavor for the BBQ sauce mixed with the Pulled Pork is reduced Root Beer ... I. LOVE. DEVILED EGGS! ... Putting Feta Cheese on anything automatically takes it to a level of awesomeness unmatched by few ... I also made lemonade from scratch today (lemon juice, simple syrup, ice and water). Sooo good! ... This was possibly the best "meal" I've had at school.
NAME THE BLOG MASCOT CONTEST IS ONGOING! Please vote to the right, and feel free to invite your friends to do the same. I'm pretty happy with the amount of votes so far! It gives me a good idea of the amount of people who read the blog and care enough about it to get interactive.
I was browsing Pens pictures the other day and sat wide-eyed in shock at my computer desk after discovering this photo of the Blog Mascot going crazy at Mellon Arena a few years back. This photo leads me to believe that a high-ranking Pens administrator so admired our carnal friend's homemade T-shirt that soon "white outs" would become common place for Penguins playoff games in years to come.This is one of those food cycles that is such a hodgepodge it's tough to define. Apple pie? Sorry, French. Soul food? Nope, African. Hamburgers!? Those European butchers had to find a way to make the less-than-best cuts of meat available to them edible.
If anything you have to go regional. You want steak in America? See you in Texas. Gumbo? Louisiana, obviously. That Maine lobster is going to be stellar in Maine and expensive as all heck in Alaska. That ham and pineapple pizza you got last week? Aloha, Hawaii.
Think comfort food. That's American food to me. Chances are one of the dishes in the above slide show was on the table at your last Thanksgiving, if not last week.
Anyway-- the rundown: Scalloped Potatoes, Fried Scallops, Beef Stew, Cheese Grits, Pot Roast (don't know where the pic of that went), Swiss Steak...you've seen and eaten these products in your life so I'm not going to badger you with the details. As we all know, they're delicious. I mean I can't eat a Swiss Steak in any capacity without immediately comparing it to my mother's.
The Codfish Cakes were tasty. You start with very heavily salted cod that has been soaked in water for a few days to cut the intense salt flavor. I'm not going to lie, when the fish was finally cooked and being shredded for the dish...it smelled like a foot. But through the miracle of cooking (and the right spices), foot fish became tasty fish. That's weird to say, sure, but it's true.
Brunswick Stew was a new one for me, and honestly it was pretty similar to the Beef Stew. The main ingredients received a bit of a face lift, however, as chicken and rabbit were used in the variations we made in class. Hearty, satisfying-- perfect for those cold Midwest nights.
Side note: I got to fabricate my first rabbits (sorry if anyone was a huge fan of Thumper in Bambi). There's not a ton of meat on the little guys, but I'd say the process is a hybrid of boning a chicken (for the legs) and a fish (for the loin and tenderloins). I must also say that rabbit is delicious. The other, other woodland creature meat I suppose.
Gumbo has been a mixed bag when it has popped up on kitchen menus this year in school. In month three, it was 50/50 if it was any good. In Catering and Buffet, the Gumbo made for the final buffet was *terrible* to say the least. And the first day or so in this food cycle, I still wasn't impressed. It's not hard to make, really, it's just easy to screw up. For some reason people go a little heavy-handed on an ingredient (be it the roux preparation or the hot sauce), and what you get is a one-hit wonder...and we're talking Aqua's "Barbi Girl" here. Yuck.
As I frequently seem to do on this blog, I'm going to rave about *my* preparation of the Gumbo. Why? People were raving about it to me, so I must have done something right. All I can modestly say is that, for once, the flavors were balanced. I didn't get bitter, ingredient, salt, burn, bitter. It just tasted like a hearty stew, and it was especially delicious over rice.
Every now and then I seem to pull something out thin air and make it delicious. I think it's because when I keep tasting something and it lets me down, I work extra hard to make it succeed when i have a crack at it. Granted this is my opinion here, but let me make one thing clear-- you don't have your peers or Chef rave about your food every day. You're lucky if you get it once a week.
The Shrimp Etoufee is similar to the Gumbo, just spicier. The "Trinity" (celery, onions and green pepper) are all mixed into a very dark roux, and after that it's time to get heavy-handed with the Cajun seasoning and Tobasco. Very tasty, I must say, but I like spicy.
I don't do pineapple and ham on a pizza, so the Pork dish had very little appeal to me. There's sweet (like say, a Honey Baked Ham), and then there's weird-sweet. I do love me some grilled pineapple though. All vegetables and fruits should be grilled whenever possible.
Succotash may be a new side dish for me. Think Creamed Corn with Lima beans and red pepper in the mix. We're talking five ingredients here, put them in a pot together, stir and boom-- Succotash. Makes a great side at your next family get together.
We end today with the Mushroom Stuffed Chicken. Honestly, I didn't care for it. That's a very weird thing for me to say --I love chicken and mushrooms-- but for some reason this dish didn't do it for me. All signs have to point to the sauce I guess, or perhaps there was a sauce on the mushrooms. Stuffing chicken is a new obsession of mine, but I think I will steer clear of this take.
OK-- all that's left before a four-day weekend starting Thursday is a BBQ in kitchen and a couple of tests/projects here and there. I'd make a point to stop back for the BBQ pics, as we're going all out (Pulled Pork, Ribs, BBQ Sauces from scratch, etc).
I will also wrap up this month of class by finally producing a list of NAME THAT MEAT MASCOT finalists, because I know there's five of you who care out there.
