U-S-A! U-S-A! (gold medal edition)

Buffet v1.0

Enjoy the slide show of our first buffet in Catering. As I mentioned in my previous post, I was mainly responsible for the smoked pickled shrimp. Hopefully you enjoy my presentations of the shrimp as that was all on me to make it look appealing. Aside from that I had a hand in this and that, piping cream cheese or arranging other garnishes.

The lobster crostini was my favorite, with the vegetable strudel and the ham/cauliflower tartlets a close second. A very surprising tasty treat was the mini stilton popovers. We took our scraps of puff pastry left from the profiteroles, mixed it with a stilton cheese (i.e. bleu cheese) and a few herbs, and then baked them to create a really falvorful mouthful that you could probably charge $1-3 apiece for. That's solid cash for something made from scraps in your kitchen.

As far as the experience...well...just look at this stuff! How cool do they look? It was awesome to finally make something more commercial and less foundations of food based. And the depth of flavor in these hors d'oeuvres is remarkable. It's much more fun to prepare something like this than do the routine <<(main dish) (sauce) (side)>> of kitchens past.

Think of any meal -- I've got the bread for it...

Alright --starting at the bottom and heading clockwise--that's a cherry/chocolate chip scone smothered in powdered sugar, miscellaneous biscuits (our group made an Italian herb and cheese variety), and corn muffins...with cheese in them. Our group pretty much looks for any excuse to stuff cheese in anything. This includes our faces every now and then when the chef isn't looking...

These are some (not finished) brined/smoked shrimp I have been working on for a couple of days in Catering and Buffet. This is the shrimp right after the smoking/cooking process but before being peeled and deveined.

The first day I prepared a brine to pickle the shrimp in, and an orange/tomato/honey relish they will eventually rest on. They sat in the brine overnight before being smoked/cooked today. Now they will sit until service tomorrow. We are doing a HUGE buffet to cap off the week tomorrow, so check back for pics if you can...

Sidenote-- I think whenever there has been a shrimp dish in any month of kitchens or at an Enthusiast Course I've been the lucky guy picked to clean/cook them. Good thing I have a lot of previous experience thanks to my dad and grandpa from the Florida vacation days...

Feeling charitable?

Molly is fundraising to run in her third marathon, the Rock 'n' Roll San Diego Marathon, on June 6. If you feel like donating a few dollars to help her out (and her cause), check out her Web site.

I'm in full support because without Hodgkin's Disease research, we Pens fans wouldn't have Mario Lemieux today. And that world...well...I want no part of it.

Thanks in advance...

Do you know the Muffin Man...?

Croissants, Croissants stuffed with chocolate and blackberry muffins. Jealous?

(clockwise, starting in the front)

A thing wrapped in a thing wrapped in a thing...and bread.

OK, what you see here is a (chicken) Galantine. It is the first thing we have created in Catering and Buffet, and it's probably the most complicated way I've ever seen what is --essentially-- cold chicken prepared.

You start with an entire chicken. I'm fresh from Meats kitchen so I'm no stranger to poultry in this form. You first remove the wings at the joint, then proceed to take the skin off the chicken IN ONE PIECE. Now this is far from easy. In fact, it's a royal pain in the ass. My partner and I were able to get it done with minimal hole-age, and you're left with what essentially looks like pants...if pants were made from chicken skin. You scrap any excess fat still clinging to the skin off, then fashion the skin into a rectangle shape.

Next you remove the chicken breasts, de-bone them if you still have the leg attached, and then remove the tenderloins from the breasts. If you've ever bought boneless chicken breasts in the store and there was an annoying piece on the bottom of the breasts that easily peels away from the rest of the mass (about the size of a chicken tender), that's the tenderloin.

After removing the tenderloins you set them on a piece of saran wrap that is coated with a seasoning (we used Old Bay). You place the thin ends of the tenderloins together in a way that makes them look like one solid roll, cover them in the old bay, then wrap the saran wrap tightly around them. You essentially are left with what looks like a Tootsie Roll...only it's a tightly-wrapped roll of seasoned chicken tenderloin. You place that in the freezer.

Then you butterfly (cut in half) the breasts, place them between pieces of saran wrap and then pound them flat with a meat mallet. You form a rectangle shape with the breasts (similar to the size/shape of the chicken skin...hmm, maybe I'm going somewhere with this?) before setting those aside.

And then (breath) you remove the thigh's and legs of the chicken. De-bone the thighs and scrape the meat off the legs, then it's off to the meat grinder. You grind the chicken with pork fat (in a 50/50 ratio). You then take the ground meat, mix with with some spices, and put it in a food processor. A little chicken liver is added and you end up with a fine, pâté-like substance. In the pâté you add some garnishes (we used pimentos, apricots, diced ham, mushrooms, pistachios and spinach).

Now comes assembly. You lay out a piece of saran wrap, and place your rectangle of chicken skin on it in an orderly fashion. On top of that you place the layer of pounded, butterflied chicken breast. Inside of that you create a layer of the pâté-like substance. And inside of that, you place your chicken tenderloin roll straight out of the freezer. Roll THAT up correctly, and you have your Galantine.

Pop some foil on the bad boy, poach it in some hot water until it's cooked through (checked via internal temp), then place it in the refrigerator. It's supposed to be served cold.

After slicing the galantine, we then applied a layer of Aspic Gelee (clear, refined protein stock with the properties of Jell-O) to add some flavor and shine to the dish. The gelee is a process in itself, pretty much like applying a few coats of paint with refrigeration for 5-10 minutes in between each coat.

Serve with micro-greens and Cumberland Sauce. End scene.

Whew. What a process, eh? We fabricated the chicken Friday, prepared and cooked the Galantine Monday, then did the whole gelee/plating process today. The end result-- tastes like chicken...but it looks a heck of a lot more interesting for sure. Now that you've read this book of a post, look at the pic again. See the tenderloins in the middle? The pâté (or "force-meat") full of garnishes around it? The chicken breast outer layer? The skin holding it all together?

Crazy. I know...


Oh, and proceeding all of this was Breads. That's Focaccia on the left (same formula as pizza dough, just used bread flour instead of high gluten flour). You generously oil the bottom of a small cake pan, add the dough, dimple the dough for a look on top, apply flavor (that's basil, oregano, thyme, red pepper flakes and caramelized onions on top of mine), some salt, a little more oil-- bake.

What you're left with is an herby, oily bread. Fantastic! I haven't eaten any yet (I will with some leftover spaghetti in the fridge) but it smells delicious.

To the right is a couple of pretzel rolls. There's some resemblance to a pretzel in the shape, but we made ours fatter because --TA-DA!!!-- it becomes perfect to make a sandwich on. That was my breakfast this morning-- salami and provolone on pretzel bread. Good Lord, how tasty.

Wow...what a novel of a post. Thanks for sticking with me to the end. More posts to come as this ridiculous month of food continues. Don't forget to become a follower of the blog!

Later for now...

Anybody out there?

Hello visitor to my blog. If you find yourself here regularly, either for the food porn or the latest update on the goings on of my life, I would like to extend the invitation to you to become a "Follower" of this blog. I only ask because it will give me a good idea of who is reading this blog regularly. This isn't a "come with me for the free Kool-Aid under the Harvest Moon" kind of situation...honest.

If you have a Google, MySpace or Twitter account, this can be accomplished quite easily under the "Followers" section of my blog to the right. It takes 2.27 seconds and would mean a lot to me. Trust me, it's nice to know people care enough to take a few seconds to give back via a nice gesture.

Thanks!

Let the fattening begin...

Cinnamon rolls on the left, Kugelhopfs on the right. A Kugelhopf is a sweet dough stuffed with raisins (or whatever...we used raisins) set into a muffin pan that is lined with almonds on the bottom. After baking you sprinkle a little powdered sugar on the bottom and you're done. They were really, really good.

If you missed the USA/Canada Olympic hockey game last night, reevaluate your life.

U-S-A! U-S-A!

Attack of the starches...

This was breakfast in day two of Breads-- a loaded personal 10" pizza. I've got some pepperoni, salami, mushrooms, artichoke, onions, oregano, a mozzarella/provolone blend of cheese and fresh mozzarella on that bad boy. I also tossed some red pepper flakes on it to finish it off. Needless to say it was delicious, and I will not be eating lunch today because of it...

To the left are the other two products of Breads this morning, baguettes! The one of the far left is a Bâtard-- a short, fatter version of the baguette. The origin of the word is French, which literally translates into 'bastard.' Quite the tasty bastard for sure!

The loaf next to it is an Epus. The point of this style of the loaf is to look like the wheat stalk. This angle may not be the greatest to display it, but it really does look like wheat. It also makes the bread easy to tear into servings for people...very cool. The look can be accomplished by using scissors to snip the bread at an angle deep into the dough, but not through it. You then alternate which way the snipped pieces lie to produce the wheat effect when baked.

The...uhh...sculpture(?) also pictured here is my tallow sculpture. Tallow is a mixture of bee's wax, rendered lamb fat and a chemical binding agent that is escaping me currently. Mind you lamb fat is traditional, the tallow we're using has shortening in it. Anyway, it's a display piece (and work in progress, no laughing) due at the end of my Catering and Buffet class.

And yes, that's a rabbit. Right now it looks straight out of Matt Groening's "Life in Hell." I will post more pics of that as I work on it and, eventually, the finished product.

Talk about a fun day of classes. Breads is going to gain me five or more pounds this month. Both loaves immediately went into the freezer for later consumption. A single man can't eat this much bread all at once...it's impossible.

Let the baking begin...

In the first day of baking in Breads we made Southwest Rolls (rolls with minced jalapeno, shredded cheese, cumin, among other things, in the dough). I must say if this sets the tone for this kitchen then it's going to be one amazing month.

A great thing about this class is we will be able to bring a lot of food home from it. I took the three rolls I brought home and made the dish you see above for lunch. I halved and covered the rolls with cheese, melting that combo before adding chicken fajita I made (red, orange and yellow pepper, more jalapeno, cumin, etc).

Sorry that pic isn't terribly great, nor is this post teribly long. Just a quick hello for now...

Snow Day 2 -- Revenge of the Frozen Yogurt

Still the worst movie ever...

"Published"

Two more of my pics have made it onto The PensBlog! Check them out in this post (my submit name to the blog is WWGRD22). This marks the second and third photos I've gotten onto the blog. Since I respect the blog for being the outlet for my Pens fandom, such an accomplishment becomes all the more sweeter...

Snow day!

"We're going to play a wonderful game called

'Who is my daddy and what does he do?"'

A walk in the snow...

So I woke up this morning at 7:30am, and for some reason, it made PERFECT sense to just throw on my boots and get out in the snow. I originally was just going to take some pics of the immediate area's situation...then I decided to document my route to school. Next thing I know I'm saying screw it and walked all the way to Mellon Arena.

It was a very peaceful walk. Not many people out, obviously, and there was the steady "crunch, crunch" of my boots propelling me along. Walking was absolutely trecherous with lots of high drifts and huge patches of ice. Downtown was especially bad (brick sidewalks in places). I almost fell, easily, about 22-27 times.

The way I stumbled across the arenas (I haven't tried to head to them since being in PIT) was kind of ass-backward. All of a sudden the Consol Energy Center (Pens new arena, opens next season) was to my right, with Mellon Arena looming dead ahead. I must say, having not been to Mellon in a long...long time...it was kind of surreal to be back. I had a 10-minute conversation or so with a guy plowing the parking lot about the Pens chances against the Caps today, and then trudged off in solitude to take a lap around the old building.

I really enjoyed my lap. I wish the Pens store was open, but I totally understood why it wasn't. That's probably good for my wallet anyway (I still need a Pens hat though, my OU one is on its last legs). Anyway, I was the only person in the area, sans four of five plow trucks clearing the lots. Just seeing Mellon again for the first time in over a decade, all the Pens fanfare...well...

..PIT just feels like home...

Random...

So I signed into Flickr today for the first time in a LONG while (I'm micromanaging a lot of pictures as of late). Had a message in my inbox that was interesting. Apparently this picture from my California adventure is being used in some online guide by Schmap.com.

Hey, why not?

FSN PIT -- "Cribs: Mark Shugar"

My camera is working, and I finally took the time to search for/find my micro-card reader. The result? I finally have the means to get pics from my digicam and cell phone on my computer! The blog will finally be able to give you a more picture-filled taste of my life in Pittsburgh! Starting with my apartment...

You enter my apartment and round a corner hallway (with closet for coats) and are greeted with this view. To the immediate left-- the kitchen. Dead ahead is the stairs --that's right stairs-- leading to my "living room." To the right is a hallway to more storage, the bathroom and my room.

The kitchen! Fridge, microwave, oven, sink (which has some dirty dishes in it right now, hence the view for the shot), dishwasher and ample counter space. I love all the space because when I really decide to cook at home, I can just spread out and cook, much like I do at school.

The view out of the kitchen over the "dining room" toward the "living room." Showcasing the dirty dishes I mentioned before, dishwasher and my cooking wines...at least I use them for cooking some of the time...

The living room has my giant blue chair...aka where I spend A LOT of time lounging after school and watching Pens games. The Malkin jersey is out because the Pens played earlier today and I was watching, and its sitting on secondary seating.

Across the banister showcasing the other side of the "living room." Yep. TV and X-BOX. That's enough to get me through most of my downtime here in PIT without a doubt...

Down the hallway to my bedroom. You can see the door to a huge storage room kinda' on the left, and some of the bathroom (which looks like a bathroom, through and through), kinda' on the right. Straight ahead is my "vanity." People always comment on it. I don't use it, but it provides quick lighting and a counter to throw stuff on in a pinch.

Man, I should have cleaned up, or at least straightened up, a little before snapping pics. This is the bedroom. Bed, desk, computer. The Pens blanket is hanging to make the room feel a bit smaller and shade me in bed/my computer from windows people could get motivated to peek in if they really wanted to. This room is strange because...

More stairs! Only these lead to like, a three-foot wide patch of elevated room that I have NO IDEA what anyone would do with it? Dressers? Plants? Cardio? No idea...

So yeah, that's the quick overview of my apartment so the mystery can finally be put to rest for some of you. That's no excuse to not come visit now though, but at least you have an idea of my digs. The great thing is this apartment, spacious as it is, is cheaper than a studio in the same building! It doesn't get any better than that. Be sure to check back soon for pics of my neighborhood, my walk route to school, etc.

SNOW! --UPDATEDx2--

CP posted this on her Twitter account last night around 10pm. That reads 6.5" if you can't see. Now at 6am, we easily have over a foot of snow in PIT with another 3-5" predicted by 11am.

This is the most snow I've seen in a *long* time. It's very exciting! Then again, it's probably only this exciting because I don't have to do anything this weekend and I don't drive here...

Will update if more pics surface...

8am UPDATE -- It's still snowing. I figure I will eventually toss on some boots, head out and take a peek to survey the situation...when I don't feel like being nice and warm in the apartment. Funny sidenote: Cordon Bleu texted, e-mailed AND called me (AND they called my parents...really weird) at 7:30am this morning to inform me there are no classes today. Umm......it's Saturday. Thanks for the newsflash. Even if there wasn't a foot+ of snow on the ground, I'm not heading to school today! :P
5pm UPDATE -- (Another CP pic above). I pulled out my boots and hit the snowy streets earlier this afternoon. Snow on the sidewalk was *at least* up to my knees, if not higher in places. It was actually kind of surreal since most people, myself included, took to walking in the streets (don't worry, car traffic was minimal), where I'd say snow was maybe 4-6 inches deep still despite obvious attempts to plow and clear them. I stopped into Giant Eagle for a few things and the place was actually busy enough I had to wait in line for a good while to check out. Who'da' thunk? Anyway, I'm guesstimating the final snow fall somewhere around 18-20 inches or so. It's the fourth-largest snowstorm in the history of PIT. All I know is that it's pretty snow, for sure...

GENO! GENO! GENO!

Pens took down the Red Wings in their first-of-two regular season meetings yesterday. Crosby and Malkin scored in the shooutout to finally put Jimmy Howard away. If the Red Wings make the playoffs this year, it will be because of Howard. He had like 47 saves in the loss.

All I care about right now is bragging rights (still) over Wings' fans until March...