Food For Thought: Throwback Thinking

Revisiting my cooking school daze

Hi subscribers: I’m taking a little break this week to recharge my creative batteries and enjoy some sunshine.

But rather than leave you without your usual Monday read I thought it would be fun to re-visit the blog I wrote nearly a decade ago when I was attending Le Cordon Bleu culinary school in Ottawa. I started the blog when I began my Intermediate Level term and it’s an entertaining look at what was going through my head as I landed in the culinary classroom full time. Think of it as an early glimpse of what is now the crazy Fine Kettle of Fish story!

Enjoy, and I’ll be back this Friday with more new content! -SF

Now We're Cookin'

We just wrapped up the first full week of classes and we’re already finished Lesson #3. Below are some photos of the dishes, as prepared by the Chef in the demo class. The first dish was Matelote de doré au vin rouge, pommes de terre persillées (Fish stew with red wine, potatoes with parsley).   This is not a glamorous dish in either appearance or taste, made worse by the fact that the pike/perch we were using isn’t in season, so we were using wretched old frozen things pulled from the bottom of the freezer.  But it was good review of cleaning and descaling fish and making fumet (fish stock). To my surprise, the Chef seemed rather pleased by my effort.  My sauce was pretty good (if bordering on a little salty), and I didn’t overcook the fish.  But the highlight of class was that I burned the shit out of my right hand, having forgotten that gas stoves get A LOT hotter than electric ones.   Not bad for Lesson 1. 

The second dish is actually something I would eat again – Poulet Basquaise (Sauteed chicken with peppers and tomatoes).  This also turned out rather well with no major criticism from the Chef.   I had my chicken deboned in a flash, the rice was good, and I was ready to serve with a little time to spare.  I’m told this dish often appears on the exam, so one to practice.

The third dish provided the comic highlight of the week – Homard à l’Armoricaine (Lobster with Armoricane sauce).   It involves tearing a live lobster limb-from-limb, extracting the meat while the pieces are still twitching, and then “reassembling” the thing on the plate for presentation.  I’ve killed more than a few lobsters, so this was no big deal to me.   But, predictably, more than a few people were squeamish.  The poor kid at the station next to me didn’t seem to understand that you have to twist the tail off the lobster.  He was tugging on it, half ripping it, and would have been torturing the poor thing if it could actually feel pain.  I had to do it for him.   My final product was okay – the sauce was a little over-reduced and I had a few loose shell chips on the plate, but not a bad effort.

I was a little worried that I’d forgotten a lot of techniques since Basic Cuisine two years ago, but it turns out I remember a lot more than I thought I would.  My knife skills are a little rusty, but I can still debone a chicken, and I seem to have handle on making sauces.

A few things have changed in those two years though – some for the better, and some distinctly not.  But I’ll save those for another post.