Give Me a B! And, I'll take it gladly!

Checked the old grades online today (man, this modern schooling thing is great!!), and there was a B next to the Pantry entry. Again, if we go by the alleged Head Chef scale--remember the "If you got an A, you wouldn't be here," philosophy?--then, I did okay.

It is somewhat disheartening to constantly wonder if I really did get an A or was I solid B student? Heck, I know I'm worrying too much about it, and a B is a perfectly acceptable grade. We'll just think of it like B for Butter, which is very palatable. : )

4 days until Christmas!! And, have I finished the shopping yet? Since I just posed that question, you can guess the answer. I did get the Chiclet a really cool thing. It's pop-up (or should that be pop-out?) measuring cups. We have to carry so much stuff in our knife kits, including a set of metal measuring cups, that it's hard to get them to roll and close. I'm thinking that this might make it just a little easier for her. Aren't they cool?(Of course, I got a set for myself, too...how can you resist such fun things! And, it came with a bonus set of measuring spoons that sort of fold in upon themselves. I so love The Container Store!)

This afternoon at SS, we had 9 or so 11-year old girls who made meals as birthday party favors. They got to make a braided bread, a half-entree, and a half-dessert. How cool is that? These "cooking" birthday parties are becoming a very popular thing at our store, and I think it's great. It really beats the heck out of pin the tail on the donkey (or elephant, whichever way your political leanings lie), plus it introduces them to the concept that cooking can be fun. If I had the proverbial nickel for everyone who came in the door and said how much they hated to cook but that coming to Super Suppers was fun and they'd definitely do it again, I'd have a nice chunk of change.

Seriously, why are so many people afraid of cooking? Probably because they were never allowed to cook as a child, or they had mothers who fed them spaghetti sauce made with ketchup (yes, I know I should let that go, but how can I?!!) And, the cult of the celebrity chef is a two-edged sword at times. It can inspire both the creative juices and that little frisson of fear up the back of your neck when you actually have to produce something for someone...trust me, been there.

Anyway, the girls seemed to be having a good time as they made their meals. They were the funniest when it came to the bread, and I guess I hadn't realized exactly how much of a forearm workout that you get when rolling out dough until I watched them struggling. Hmmm...maybe that should give rise to a whole lineup at Food Network: Aerobics in the Kitchen. I work up a sweat while sitting on the couch and watching ol' Rachael Ray do the hand jive every time she explains a meal, a technique, etc. That girl must burn 5,ooo calories a minute...and I burn at least 200-300 just being annoyed with her, I'm sure.

Gotta go put in some time at the ol' laundry pit down in the basement of doom. We're heading to see The Man's tribe somewhere near the Arctic Circle...at least that's where he likes to pretend he's from with all his "you've never really been cold" diatribes...you would think he comes from Yetis instead of perfectly lovely folks. (For the record, I have been in St. Cloud, MN on Christmas Day before, and it was a balmy -10 °F, thank you very much. I consider that too damn cold in my book.) Anyway, gotta make sure I have clean long johns and other survival gear for the northward trek. Oh, and presents...gotta wrap the presents...gotta finish getting the presents first.

Happy Howlidays to you all from all of us here at Poodlevania--me, The Man, and Banes of our Existence: Rickety Fat Dog, The Goldfish, and The New Hotness.

Tiny Trees...and some wine

Not enough wine, but some wine.

Volunteer catering gig went pretty well Friday evening. People were very complimentary about the food and the set up, and that's what makes it worthwhile...well, no, I'm lying about that. Money makes it worthwhile, but since this was a volunteer gig, accolades and high praise will have to do.

The concept for our event was a Festival of (Tiny) Trees and Wreaths, wherein we solicited donations from local business and civic-type groups, as well as any individual who wanted to donate a fully decorated tree or wreath for a silent auction, and the money would go for books at the local library. It really is a good cause, and we did it last year and made quite a bit of moola for books.

In keeping with (what we hope is) the tradition but bearing in mind that people may not want to buy a full-size tree, we tacked the "tiny" part on for this year. We requested trees that were between 2-4 feet, but wreaths could be any size. We got some very creative entries this year, and our group did a Chronicles of Narnia-themed tree...we were trying to follow up on our success from last year with a Harry Potter-themed tree that went for $175 at the auction, but there aren't any damned Narnia ornaments out there. How can this be?

The only "official" Narnia ornament is this one from Hallmark of Lucy coming through the wardrobe. It's a cool, 2-sided ornament, but it way hard to build a tree out of a single ornament. So, off to the Disney store we go, and we co-opted a couple of action figure sets to make our tree. (Stupid me forgot camera tonight, so I don't have a picture to post yet...I know someone took pix (KB, that would be your child!), so I can post one later.)

I wired a large action figure of the White Witch to the front, and it sort of took off from there. (Yes, I know she's the bad guy in this tale, but she was just too perfect as a large ornament. Besides, why do you think there's a "Disney Villains" collection? It's for people like me who admire the evil that 'toons do! )

I can post some pix of last year's Harry Potter tree instead, because I am really, really, really pleased with the way it turned out. Of course, I can't focus the camera worth a crap, but you can get the general idea.

See the giant Snitch out in front? I made that. Yes, me. And I'll share the secret with you! I found this cool styrofoam ornament that had all sorts of gold beads, glitter, and a general covering o' shiny stuff. Next, you get a large white dove (not a real one, of course!), or if you can find just a set of wings in your local crapt store (Hobby Lobby, Michael's, etc), get the biggest ones you can find. The ones from the dove just sort of pulled out and had these lovely wire posts that I just drove down into either side of the gold ball. Viola! Instant Snitch!

We were lucky that Target had 2 official HP ornaments last year--Harry on his broom and the Hogwarts Express engine--which really got us going. I found a double-decker bus to sub for the Knight Bus, a Crookshanks-style cat, some brooms, and a bunch of tiny wire rim glasses (in the Doll section at the crapt store) that we painted black. I can't remember all the ornaments--there was an beautiful white owl for Hedwig. Some little black cauldrons left from Halloween and wands made from cinnamon sticks and glitter were added as well. I think the piece d' resistance (besides my Snitch) was using a large Halloween witch's cauldron for the base...that made it rock.

It was a very hard tree to give up, especially while it lived on my coffee table for a week or so. I kept repeating "it's for a good cause; it's for a good cause."

The Man has come down with some sort of 24-48 bug that is beginning to transfer itself to me...oh, joy. This is going to make getting up at 5:30 in the morning so much fun. We have to be at school at 7 am for our finals (that's everyone in the whole culinary program), and after we finish our respective tests, we get to clean the kitchen. My absolute favorite thing in the whole wide world (is the sarcasm coming through loud and clear?).

I'm taking the weary body to bed in hopes that I can remember everything I need to about eggs, cheese, and gelatin strengths. Wish me well!

One More Day...

Today was probably the most low-key day we've had in the last 3 quarters. We had no projects of our own, no practicals, just one little test on cheese and some prep work for Chef Pantry and Chef Banquet.

I diced up 2 22-quart containers full of peeled potatoes; they were destined for some sort of mashed potato dish. We trimmed green beans, bagged up bulk pasta, and made some hors-d'oeuvres (last time!!) for a wine seminar/tasting. See, low key.

Chef gave us back our egg projects, and he liked my little 50 ways song. I know he thinks I'm weird, but whatever!

We actually got out of class early today (I know, I was shocked, too), so I had time to go shopping for this volunteer gig that I'm catering on Friday. I'm not actually doing a lot in the way of making things; it's more of a "Costco catering" gig. I'm kind of torn about that, because I have been in culinary school for the last 1o+ months, so I should be able to do something exciting along the catering lines, but I just don't have the time or the energy. I'm just drained lately, and it's hard to muster up the enthusiasm and energy to construct tiny little yummy things, especially since I have no time. While I'm not doing it for money--that "volunteer" word is the big clue--I'm not going to do total crap, either...I have a plan.

It's all in the presentation, baby! And, there's nothing wrong with using quality pre-made products ("quality" being the operative word here), according to Chef Pantry, to supplement your offerings. It goes back to labor costs, both time and money, and ingredients. Yeah, I could make the black olive tapenade that you get at Costco, but it would probably cost me way more in ingredients, not to mention the time it would take to round up olives, etc. and process them, than the $6.95 for the large tub. And, have you tasted that olive tapenade stuff you can get at Costco? It's really good...just ask my ankles when I overindulge in it and make them swell. (It really is hell getting old.)

I'm going to blanch some young whole green beans for the vegetable tray to make it a little different, and make a nice dip for it (bah to the bland and boring ranch dressing!) and other dips for fruit, etc., so it's not like everything will be out of a plastic bag or container. (Do you like this defensive pose I am striking??)

My basic menu for the evening is a veggie tray with dip, assorted cheese platter with crackers and grapes, mini quiches (spinach and Lorraine), spinach dip with pita chips, strawberries and pineapple with Coco-Lopez dip, olive tapenade with crackers, and assorted sweets...the rest of my volunteer group are responsible for bringing some sort of bite-size dessert offering.

I think I have all the basic cocktail requirements covered: sweet, salty, vegetarian...

From the "Now They've Really Taken the Safety Off" Department, I bring you this:



Yes, boys and girls, it really is Ready-to-Eat Cheesecake Filling!

It stopped me dead in my tracks at the Publix last night as I was browsing the cream cheese selection. I had visions of rescue personnel breaking down doors to find people stuck on their couches, empty tubs of cheesecake filling littering the floor, with sobbing family members on the lawn, staging an intervention, and the prying of the spoon from my fat little fingers...which probably wouldn't be so little any more. This might replace tubes of frozen cookie dough as the new pink or whatever you call cookie dough--comfort food? Comfort gooey substance is more like it.

The ad copy reads: "One Step to Dessert Heaven" (wonder if that's via cardiac arrest?). The directions tell you spread it into a 9-inch graham cracker crust, slice, and serve. It also exhorts you to "personalize" your cheesecake by "stirring in mix-ins like Baker's chocolate, Oreo cookie crumbles, and fresh fruit" (look--healthy stuff!) directly into the tub before spreading in the crust. (Ha! who needs a crust? We don't need no stinkin' crust!)

Unfortunately for you, gentle readers, I resisted the siren's call and walked away from it. I don't know if it's the best thing since sex or not, but I just couldn't bring myself to buy it. (Remember the vision of rescue personnel?) But, the lure is still there...it's probably just a matter of time.

Time...yeah, I need time, lots of time...time to really savor a tub of cheesecake filling.

Cheesecake....mmm...


(Yes, I know this is a famous and beautiful painting by John William Waterhouse, and I probably shouldn't have co-opted such a lovely piece of art, but it's all about illustrating the concept! And cheesecake!)

Could It Get ANY Worse?

I know, I know, be careful what you wish for, but I'm telling you, today was the pits.

Day 1 of the final practical. We will complete the practical next Monday, and then have a written final the following Monday. We received 12 eggs to last us the 2 days, and we have to produce the following per practical day:

Day 1: 2 California sushi rolls, 2 orders Asparagus or Broccoli Polonaise, and 2 oranges cut into segments.

Day 2: 1 Quiche Lorraine, 2 servings of spinach souffle, 2 servings, 2 eggs each, of Poached Eggs Mornay, and 2 eggs fried over easy. (What--no partridge and a pear tree?)

We have 6 teams in class, and Chef split us in half and one half of the class did Day 1 and the other Day 2...guess who got the partridge and the pear tree?

And, guess who was appointed sous chef for the day? Yeppers, that was me, too. Normally, being sous chef is fun, because you get to grab stuff out of the walk-in and prepare things for the rest of the class, and (the best part) you get to direct the clean-up operations at the end, without really having to any real hands-on cleaning. Usually not a bad deal. Unless, of course, you have the laundry list of stuff to do from Day 2.

Personally, I think Chef should have chosen one of the Day 1 slackers to be sous chef, but in the end, I'm not sure it really mattered. As a result of being the fetch and carry gal, I was a bit behind in my preparations for my dishes...and I kept getting farther and farther behind, because I was continually tasked with stuff to do or get. Chef kept saying that he wasn't going to penalize me on time, because he knew this was cutting into my completing the dishes. HA! I really did need one of the those Time Turner thingys from Harry Potter that Hermione used, which allowed her to take extra classes.

Thank heavens for the Chiclet. Even though it was a test, and it's probably technically cheating, she measured out a lot of my ingredients while I was running hither and yon and yon and hither. And, honestly, I don't see why it would be a big deal. If I can't measure out 12 ounces of heavy cream and 3 ounces of flour by now, I got heap more bigger problems than her doing it for me. After all, I'm the one that had to murd--I mean poach those poor eggs.

The good news, because I do need some positive pats and snaps, was that the spinach souffles rocked. They puffed up nicely, had a great flavor and consistency. And considering that I sort of slapped them together between the to-ing and fro-ing, I was pretty darn pleased.

On the other hand, the Quiche Lorraine was not very pretty at all. My crust suffered from some shrinkage (okay, quite a bit of shrinkage), and I spilled about 1/3 of my custard mixture when I was putting the filled tart pan in the deck oven. We were using the higher deck for the quiches, and it was awkward since I'm more of what you would call an "average height." Not to fear, everybody in the Day 2 group had screwed up quiche. The flavor was good; but there just wasn't a proper filling to crust ratio.

(And, why is it that I made quiches all spring/summer, thanks to the super egg producing factories know as the neighbor's chickens, with and without homemade crusts, that rose up lovely and tall and didn't suffer from any shrinkage, etc.? Why?)

Quiche that consistently looked like this:

And didn't resemble some sort of pancake with bacon sprinkled in it...actually, that doesn't sound too bad, now does it?.

Chef finally took pity on us and said we could do the fried eggs on Monday. Which was good, I guess, because my nerves were completely frazzled by this point, and I'm going to be doing good to have enough eggs left to complete the practical. I have to produce 2 over easy plus hard boil 1 or 2 for the polonaise. (I'll explain more about the polonaise after that half of the practical...I'm too worn out to contemplate explaining it.)

My Poached Eggs Mornay ended up being sort of 1 Half-assed Poached Egg Mornay. I couldn't keep my yolks from breaking to save my life. And, I ran out of time to actually finish the dish. Eggs Mornay is a lot like Eggs Benedict: there's poached eggs, on a toast round or crouton, a creamy sauce (Mornay is a creamy cheese sauce made from a bechamel with the addition of Gruyere), and little extra cheese on top that is slid under the salamander for just a few seconds. I got 1 egg on 1 toast round with some sauce. And when I tried to put the egg on the sauce and toast, it slid right off and onto the plate and started dribbling yolk.

I gave up at that point. It was obvious that the kitchen gods were against me, and nothing was going to go right today. The icing on the cake or should I say topping on the souffle was getting out out of class about 45 minutes late, in the dark, in the rain, and there was an accident or road blockage no matter which way I turned. It took an hour and a half to get home. (The Poodles were most displeased by this turn of events, especially since I decreed that tonight was dinner out night at the Mexican restaurant with cheap Dos Equis draft, and we would therefore be abandoning them again.) (The Dos Equis was a good thing...and it's making me wonder why I'm not drinking more after dealing with days like today. And, I believe I've got a dusty bottle of Jose Cuervo somewhere, and I can dig up a ratty lime from the bottom of the fridge, so I may just continue my little pity party.)

Bottoms Up!

Nooooo!! Anything but MORE cheese!!!

I'm not really complaining about more cheese, because we actually made cheese in class today. (Yep, another skill set I can add to my resume: "cheesemaker.") (Stop laughing.) (Skillz are good.)

We made several different kinds of fresh cheeses. Everyone had to make fresh mozzarella, which is great fun, and then we did some cheeses by teams--ricotta, queso blanco, mascarpone, and lemon cheese. We also took some of the fresh mozzarella and rolled it up with a walnut-basil pesto as sort of a rouladen or pinwheel.

Cheese making in your home (or classroom) kitchen is actually pretty easy to do. You don't need a cow or a goat, but you may need some specialty products for some of the cheeses.

Essentially you need whole milk, heavy cream, or half-and-half; and some sort of acid, like lemon juice, cider vinegar, tartaric acid, or citric acid. If you're making mozzarella, you'll need to purchase some mozzarella curd, because not a lot of people have rennet lying around.

Lemon cheese is a lot like Boursin in texture with a lemony flavor, according to Chef Pantry. (We don't know this yet, because we have to let the cheeses hang and drain/dry until Wednesday's class, when we'll get to actually taste them. I'll report back on how they turned out later this week.) Basically, you heat milk and heavy cream and add lemon juice and stir until it thickens. Rest at room temp for 3-4 hours, then bundle it up in cheesecloth and let it drain over a bowl in the fridge for 8-12 more hours. Then, you can add some lemon zest and pepper and press it into a mold. See, easy.

Mascarpone is that expensive little tub of Italian cheese that is one of the main ingredients of tiramisu...that, and those damn ladyfingers that you can never find when you need them. Chef gave us a recipe for mascarpone that will probably save tons of money. Sure, it has heavy cream, which is expensive, but when compared to that little tub o' cheese goo, it's a real cost saver.

Mascarpone (makes 32 fl oz; adjust as necessary)

64 fluid ounces heavy cream

1/2 tsp tartaric acid (found it online for 7.50 for 4 ounces, which will make a lot of mascarpone)

Heat cream to 180°F, stirring often to prevent scorching. Remove from heat. Add tartaric acid and let cream coagulate into a curd.

Drain curd for at least 24 hours under refrigeration in a strainer lined with a coffee filter. Mascarpone is ready to use, or you can store it in a covered container under refrigeration for up to 7 days.

The coolest thing by far today was making fresh mozzarella. That was neat, and we got to eat some, too.
I really, really love caprese salad with fresh mozzarella slices, some ripe tomatoes, a little basil chiffonade and drizzled with just a little olive oil and maybe a balsamic reduction. That's my idea of summer heaven. And, mid-fall heaven, too. I had some grape tomatoes, little balls of mozzarella (from the expensive trip to the farmer's market), some fresh basil, so I whipped up a little caprese to go with dinner tonight.

If you want to make your own mozz, you need some mozzarella curd, which you'll have to purchase. Todaro Brothers seems to have a fairly reasonable price for the curd, so you might want to give it a whirl. The rest of the ingredients are extremely cheap: water and salt. Whoo hoo!

The key to proper cheese making seems to lie in getting the temperature right. All our recipes were very specific on the temperature that the water or milk needed to be at to have the magic of cheese occur. The mozz was the simplest, because you essentially melt the curd, then work it into the shape you want. Don't overwork it, because it can get tough.

Fresh Mozzarella Cheese (yields 2 lbs.)

3 oz salt
1 gal water
2 lbs cheese curd, cut into 1/2-inch cubes

Procedure

Add salt to the water and bring it to 160°F. Remove pot from heat. Lower cheese curd in a colander into the hot water, completely submerging the curds.

Work the curd with wooden spoons, stretching it until it becomes a smooth but stringy mass. Maintain water temperature at a constant 160°F. (We actually left the pot on the eye with the flame on for this stage.)

Remove cheese from water after all the curds have melted and been incorporated. You want it to look sort of shiny.

Working quickly, shape cheese into balls of various sized as you like. Use a dish of ice water to cool your hands as you shape. Store the cheese balls covered and under refrigeration for up to 5 days.

See, told you it was easy. You too can have skillz, mad skillz, I tell you! (And, 2 recipes today!! Can you believe it?)

Who Ate ALL the Cheese?

That would be me. Urp.

Monday = Cheese Day. We discussed and tasted beaucoup cheeses...some good, some okay, and....well, let's just say I did something that I've always wanted to do. One of those things that you've heard about all your life and may never have done. Yes, gentle readers, I brought in Limburger! Hee!

Chef said if we wanted to, and it was not required, we could stop by the grocery store and grab an interesting cheese for class. Don't spend a lot of money, he said, but get something out of the ordinary--no domestic Cheddar or Monterey Jack. So, I opted for Limburger. I figure we've all heard about it, maybe some people have even tried it, but it's worth the $2.99 I paid for it just for the experience, no? I also got a Greek cheese, kaseri, to try as well. (You can tell I went to the international farmer's market, can't you? I spent waaaay too much money, but it was fun! And, holidays are coming--you always spend more for holiday food...gotta have something to make a resolution about, don't ya?)

The kaseri (or kasseri) is the Greek version of mozzarella. It's a mild white cheese and most often used in Saganaki--the flaming cheese dish you find in a lot of Greek restaurants. The waiter brings the cheese, pours a liqueur on it, lights it up and screams "Opa!" Great fun. Because what's the only thing better than cheese? Why melted cheese, of course!

Limburger...the stuff of legends, an honorable mention in a B-52s song, and Looney Tunes staple, where a mere whiff of the stuff could curl your toes and knock you out or make your animated eyes spin in pain. Chef walked by our table and picked up the foil wrapped cheese and just grinned. I think he was pleased that I had brought it. I figured what the heck--I'm sure most of my classmates haven't tried it, but we've all heard about it, so take that Nike philosophy to heart and let's just do it.

Limburger is is made from cow's milk and is soft-ripened for about 3 months. It originated in Belgium and is now also made in the United States; however, most limburger comes from Germany. It's an innocous looking cheese, with a rind sort of like a Brie or a Camembert and the interior is soft and creamy, again like a Brie...an extremely well-aged Brie. A Brie that may have been buried for a month or two and dug up...kind of the kimchee of cheeses.

Seriously, it was not as malodorous as it's been depicted on stage and screen. It is fairly pungent, and the pungency does increase the longer it ages, but it's by no means knock your socks off and curl your fashionably straight hair stinky. If you like strong cheeses, you might like Limburger. Then again, you might be ready for skunk jerky as well. I brought home what was left to challenge The Man with, and he was game. I'll check on it again in a few days and see if the stink factor has increased.

We had a couple of blues--a Danish, a Gorgonzola, and one of my faves--Saga Blue, which is a blue-veined Brie...that's my idea of heaven. Manchego, a hard Spanish goat cheese, is pretty tasty with quince paste; a quince is sort of a combination of pear and apple.

We also learned about how to serve cheese, as in setting up a cheese board for a customer or for a cheese course. There are 6 different types or textures of cheese: Fresh, Soft & Rind, Semi-soft, Hard, Grating, and Blue, and you should bear these textures in mind when creating a cheese course or platter. Don't put too many of the same texture, like both brie and camembert, which are soft, or strong flavors, like Gorgonzola and Stilton, on your platter. Balance is the key. And, do something to identify the different cheeses--little placards or flags or something to let your guests know what they are eating in case they like it or not. Chef said you would basically look like a doofus if YOU didn't know what the guest were eating, and they asked you about it. How hard is it to Google, I ask you?

Some fun cheese trivia: Maytag Blue is made in Iowa and was a collaboration between Iowa State University and the Maytag family farm...yep, that Maytag family of appliance fame. Also, Coach, the leather folks, have opened a cheese making business in upstate New York and are producing a very nice goat cheese (montrachet).

Happy Thanksgiving, with cheese or without! We're doing X-perimental Turky Day at our house--I'm brining a turkey for the first time, so I'll let you know how it goes. I'm using an Alton recipe, so I'm sure it's going to work out just fine. Now, off to make the cranberry congealed salad that feeds thousands!

The Citrus Reigns Supreme

Sigh...I'm reaching, I know.

Today's class was worth the price of admission or at least tuition for this quarter, because we learned how to make citrus segments, or supremes in "chef speak." Supremes are the segements of oranges and grapefruits that are free of that nasty white pith and lie jewel-like on the plate.

I have struggled and struggled, cursing and moaning the whole time, trying to figure out how to do this, and why the hell I never Googled it before I started this blog entry, I have no idea. Because, if I had, I would have found this lovely little step-by-step set of instructions from the fine folks at Sunkist. (Smacks hand into forehead, then pokes finger in eye.)

Basically, you cut the top and bottom off your orange or grapefruit, and then take your paring knife and cut away all the outer peel/rind of the fruit. You could zest the orange first and save the zest in the freezer for later. After you have removed the pith and peel, working over a bowl, hold the fruit in the palm of your left hand (adjust if you are a Lefty), and carefully cut the segments out. Do sort of a "V" around the segment and just push it into a bowl. Let's borrow a nice illustration from the Sunkist site for demonstration purposes.



If I had found that website sooner, we could have all been saved a lot of grief, my feet, some tuition money, and I would not have embarked on this whole culinary school roller coaster of insanity.

Here's a better picture that I swiped from somewhere else:



It gives more detail and a better idea (than the line drawing) of where you are supposed to cut.

After you have removed all the segments from the fruit, squeeze the remaining fruit over the bowl; the juices help preserve the segments. That's it. Period. No big mystery there, now is there?

Chef demoed quite a few fruit cuts and assembled a simple fruit display. The coolest thing were the papaya crowns. He did those as garnish, and they looked really neat. If you check out this site, there are more elaborate crowns, and a nifty tutorial on making them and little vegetable cups.
(Where the hell have I been, and why have I not been Googling this stuff all along??)

While we're on the subject, let's talk about papayas. Hate them. Plain and simple. They taste kind of like soap to me...sometimes like kerosene, or what I imaging kerosene to taste like if I were to drink kerosene. (But, I'm not quite there yet!) I know, I know, it's weird. The first time I was presented with fresh papaya, I was excited, because it was a new and different tropical fruit. I eagerly put some on my plate and got ready to be transported to a tropical paradise complete with hot young Antonio Banderas-looking cabana boys and drinks with umbrellas. I'm sure if anyone had actually been looking at me when I ate the first bite, all thoughts of cabana boys and paradise would have flown straight out the window. Ick! I thought, this is bad, very bad. Maybe it wasn't quite ripe, I think to myself, so I get another piece to try. Urk...even worse than the first one. I've tried it again and again, even once more today, and I still think it tastes waaaaaay bad. Way bad. Maybe, I'm just not wired right to appreciate that little bit of tropical paradise...but I can still appreciate the cabana boys.

Another fruit we discussed today was the star fruit or carambola...sometimes called "Chinese tamarind," according to the Chiclet, or at least in her home country. Personally, I've never been that impressed with the flavor of the star fruit, but it does look pretty and is sort of a built-in garnish. I always thought they came from far away, which was why they're so expensive, and that might account for the lack of flavor, i.e., picked before ripened, etc., but no, they're now grown commercially in Florida. So, why the heck are they so expensive, then? It's not like Florida is half a hemisphere away or anything, like Sri Lanka is, where they are also grown. I guess exotic = expensive...which is probably why I would never make it on the exotic dance circuit...unless maybe I covered myself in star fruit slices, orange segments, and worn a papaya crown?

It seemed to work for this woman.



"Oh, cabana boy!"

Oops, We Hors-d'oeuvred Again!

Just when you think we're finally dunzo with the apps and hors-d'oeuvres and moving on to fruit, Chef says there's a few things we didn't get to complete last week, so we'll do them today. We originally had fruit for both class days this week, but he says we only need 1 day for fruit, so get back on the tray and pump out the apps, pump them out!

Here's what we got:

Rissoles
Broiled Shrimp w/Garlic
Calamari w/Spicy Tomato Sauce
Samosas with Tamarind Sauce
Corn Crepes with Asparagus & Smoked Salmon
Vitello Tonnato
Scallop Mousse on Toast Points
Risotto Croquettes

The Rissoles were interesting...a sort of little deep fried empanada thing covered in bread crumbs. The filling involved a sauteed mixture of onions, shrimp, apples, and curry powder. Then, you popped some of this filling into a little pie dough crust, dipped it in egg wash, rolled it in bread crumbs, and fried that puppy. It was odd, to say the least, texture-wise, but not bad tasting.

The Broiled Shrimp with Garlic were a disaster...and I hate to say it, but it was because of Dimmer. It's an easy dish--basically butterflied shrimp sauteed with garlic in butter, topped with a mixture of buttery garlicky breadcrumbs, which were quickly browned under the salamander. How hard is that? Actually, they get really hard and burned when you leave them under the salamander for more than 30 seconds.

A salamander is not a little amphibian that I fish out of the pool or a mythological fire-dwelling lizard, but rather an extremely high-heat broiler. A piece of equipment that we have discussed the uses of and how it works, etc. throughout several classes. The biggest lesson being "don't walk away from the damn salamander when you put something under it because it will burn into cinders if left unattended," and which she should have known. Nope. She pops the shrimp under the salamander and walks away...way away.

I'm busily screwing up samosa making when I hear the dreaded cry of "who's stuff is burning?", and I look up to see Big Stuff (who, by the way, has really turned himself around in the teamwork department and may need a new nickname) snatching a sheet pan out of the salamander with some rather toasty blackened bread crumbs on top. Dim was all "oh, that's mine," in a rather nonchalant voice and meandered over to the pan. I think there was a collective rattle down the line as all our eyeballs rolled completely to the back of our heads.

Then, she sticks them in the oven to keep warm, where they continued to cook. This dish was supposed to be done a la minute (i.e., basically at the last minute), and we're a good 20-30 minutes from plate up. A few minutes later, I see her wandering over to the line with another sheet pan in hand and asking whose stuff was on the work table (it was Big Stuff's sheet pan of the risotto croquettes) and announcing that it needed to be moved because she needed the space. Excuse me? Big is in the middle of frying his croquettes and needs that space himself. He just ignored her and kept on frying his stuff, and she just wandered away, pan still in hand. I don't know if she has a learning disability, if she's just so tunnel visioned that she can't see any sort of a big picture or what, but I'm thinking she could be very dangerous in the kitchen. It makes me wonder what a day spent shadowing her at her regular job would be like. Then again, I have a hard enough time sleeping lately that I think I'll forego that idea.

The Vitello Tonnato is a classic dish involving veal that is ruined by the addition of a sauce made with canned tuna. Granted, it is the leg of veal and not the most tender part, but still, I don't think it deserves the fate of being paired with canned tuna. Nothing deserves that fate. Big Stuff and the Omelet King were in charge of that, and they were very careful during plate up to barely drizzle the sauce on the meat so we could still salvage it and eat it. Chef is mildly amused by my, Big, and the King's aversion to all things involving canned tuna, and he tells us all to be sure and taste the sauce and looks pointedly at the 3 of us. Ha!

Big and the King also made some risotto croquettes, which basically involved making a nice thick rissoto, chilling it down, and then forming it into smallish balls, rolling the balls into breadcrumbs, and frying. Did I mention that there was a yummy cube of Fontina cheese in the middle? Oh, yeah! They were very filling, so I would only want 2, maybe 3 at the most in an appetizer portion, but very, very tasty.

The Chiclet and I were in charge of making samosas, which are popular in South Asia, primarily in India and Pakistan. I frequently got them at the international farmer's market near where we used to live, and The Man always referred to them as "mashed potato hot pockets." I liked the vegetarian ones best, which were mostly a curried mashed potato mixture : ), but the real star of the dish to me was the tamarind dipping sauce. Love that stuff. As far as I was concerned, the samosa was merely a conveyance for the dipping sauce.

The samosa recipe we had called for a shrimp filling, and since we were using shrimp in 2 other dishes, Chef said we needed to come up with something else. I piped up with the potato idea, which he liked, and to which the Chiclet looked at me like I was nuts. Trust me, I told her, this will work. Then, I noticed there was no dipping sauce, tamarind, or otherwise, with the dish. I mentioned this to Chef, who said we needed to come up with one. He's musing aloud about how to do it, and mentions something about seeing "Bobby Flay do one the other day." Hee--Chef watches the Food Network! He did a little surfing and came back with a simple one that involved a little tamarind paste, brown sugar, water, garlic, and ginger cooked to a syrupy state and finished with a little garam masala...which we were out of the pre-mixed version, so I had to concoct some out of a melange of spices. A little cinnamon, ground coriander, ground cloves, and ground cardamom did the trick, and we had a fabulous sauce.

The samosas? Well, the technique was not so fabulous, but we managed to make some passable little football triangles. That was a funny thing, too. Chiclet was trying to figure out how to fill and fold the dough, and Chef says "fold it like a football." She, not being from this country orignally, says "soccer or American?", which cracks up me and Chef. He tells her no, like the footballs you played with in class--paper football. She's drawing a blank still and reminds him that she's "not from around here." He looks at me and says, "I know *you* know what a paper football is," and I confess that I do, having been made to stand in the hall in my 7th grade math class for playing paper football instead of doing fractions.

My favorite thing of the day was the calamari. Love the little squid rings. Mother Hen made those, and she did 2 different styles of breading. One was the standard breading of flour, egg, and bread crumbs, which made a heavier breading. The best was the seasoned flour one. She dredged the calmari in seasoned flour, shook off the excess, and fried them, and they were so light and crispy. And, you got more of the calamari flavor. The heavier breaded ones tasted more like well, breading. She did a lovely spicy tomato sauce to go with them, and they were the first things to go. Even Head Chef and some other chefs who were there for a meeting came out and devoured them. They ate a couple of other things, but they were all over the calamari.

Wednesday is the fruit day, and Chef promises that I will be able to properly segment an orange after that class. I told him that if I could do it without screwing it up and tearing it to pieces, I would consider it well worth whatever money I've paid out for school so far. He grinned a little evil grin and said that I would be sick of peeling oranges after he got done with me. Can't wait!

Bon Appetizer

Hot Apps! Get your hot apps here!

Party food is some of my favorite food in all the world...high end or low end. I really do love little bites of yummy goodness, and I could probably eat that Super Bowl staple, Ro-Tel Dip with the little scoop Tostitos, until I throw up. (There's a lovely image, no?) Give me little meatballs, some funky dip and a cracker, and I'm happy.

So, we moved on to appetizers, which are just more elaborate, sometimes larger portioned hors-d'oeuvres (I will be glad when we're done with this stuff, because I'm getting tired of typing "hors-d'oeuvres"...tired, I tell you.), and this bunch is all hot/cooked items.

Le Menu for your perusal:

Beef Carpaccio
Clams Casino
Deviled Crab Cakes
Gorgonzola Custards
Oysters Diamond Jim Brady
Chicken Satay with peanut sauce
Paper Wrapped Chicken
Spring Rolls
Stuffed Shrimp (with crabmeat dressing)
Sushi
Spinach Crepes with Seafood filling

The Chiclet and I were in charge of the beef carpaccio and the gorgonzola custards. I know it's raw meat, but it was really, really, really good raw meat. We took one of those prime NY strips from that high-end meat company demo and seared it on all sides to get some color. Then, we mixed some fresh herbs, a little garlic, salt and freshly ground black pepper with a little extra virgin olive oil and slathered it on the seared steak. Popped that baby into the freezer for about 2 hours, and then sliced it, or rather shaved it thinly and served it with olives, capers, and grated Parmesan reggiano. It was like butter. I figure I'm more likely to have a poodle trip me on the basement stairs and break my neck than get mad cow disease, so I'm just not going to think about it. I make no apologies for liking my steak medium-rare and sometimes eating raw meat. I was proud that everyone in our class tried it, even people who seemed a bit leery about the "raw" part. (Although, I must confess that I am having to learn/force myself at times to eat pork "medium." After a bajillion years of hearing that we need to cook it to shoe leather, it's hard to try anything else, but I'm giving the pink a whirl.)

According to Italian Food Forever, beef carpaccio was invented at Harry's Bar in Venice, which I believe gave us the Bellini. And, what goes better with party food than party cocktails?! Party cocktails = good, very good! (BTW, this Italian Food Forever website looks like a real find. I could waste many hours looking around at all the yummy recipes.)

The key to the carpaccio is to get the best piece of meat possible. Pay that extra buck for prime--you'll be glad you did.

We all took our turn at making California rolls, which turned out pretty good. It was very interesting to see the folks who'd never had wasabi before as they tasted it...kinda like that scene in that dumb Whoopi-Ted Danson movie where he takes the whole plug in his mouth at once.

And, why is it we can never get anything to unmold properly? I did most of the work on the custards. I thoroughly buttered the ramekins, and we followed the procedure of putting them in a water bath and not over cooking them. But, when we tried to unmold them, the bottoms kept getting stuck. Out of the 10 we had, we got 1 that unmolded perfectly onto a plate for our presentation, which was what we really needed, but still! The others sort of half-assed came out and we just piled them together on a plate and stuck a little parsley around them to dress them up. This happens every time we have to do a custard, and we're totally at a loss as to what goes wrong.

This class is still fairly large...we've lost a couple of people, but there's still 12 of us, so I don't have a lot of interaction with Dimmer, since she's on the other side of the room. However, I still get to see her food and sometimes see her in action...like yesterday, with the jalapenos she was chopping WITHOUT GLOVES! Call me a wimp about this, and I'll call you goofy, because cutting hot peppers without gloves is just nuts. Trust me...been down that road before. You will have to stick your finger in your eye at some point before the capsaicin wears off your hands...like right before you go to bed and have to remove your contacts...yeah. And, she should know better than to not wear gloves. I mentioned to her that she might want to be wearing them, and she was like "oh? okay," in a unsure of why I was telling her to do that tone of voice, and then says "we do have to do that at work." Duuuh! And, then, what happens when I get back to my station, and there's the Chiclet about to do the same thing. Gloves, people! We have a ton, and that's what part of your lab fee goes toward!
(And, while I was doublechecking my spelling of capsaicin, I found this interesting article about its uses in fighting prostate cancer. Yes, it is ingested rather than rubbed on.)

Continuing with the appetizer theme, we actually got homework. (shakes head) The assignment is to write about diffferent appetizers or hors-d'oeuvres (last time!) from 5 different cultures and write up 5 or so of each. Personally, I'd prefer to go out to 5 different restaurants and try 5 or so apps each, but that's probably not going to happen...darn it.

Hors-d'oeuvres from Hell

Well, not really from Hell, but it makes a nice title, don't ya think?

Actually, it was more like I was in hell, or rather my feet were. Damned plantar crap is popping up again. It was so bad this weekend, that I put my feet in the pool as soon as I got home...in the 40-degree pool. Hey--I figured they were inflammed, and cold sometimes takes out inflammation, and it was easier than making an ice foot bath. I lasted all of 2 minutes. Polar bear girl I am not. And, it came back with a new development--shooting heel pain in my right heel. Loverly.

Back to the food, because that's what we're all here for, anyway. Monday's Pantry class was all about (mostly) cold hors-d'oeuvres and appetizers, and what the difference between an app and a hors-d'oeuvre (which is hands down the hardest word on the planet to spell consistently...even worse that the fear of the number 13...that triske--whatever.) According to our text, the translation from the French is "outside the meal," because hors-d'oeuvres are literally served before you sit down for the meal. If it's part of the meal, then it's an appetizer and is usually a bit larger portion than the 1-2 bite hors-doeuvre. Both serve basically the same function--to perk up your appetite for the meal to come.

Here's our menu:

Blue Cheese Mousse piped into Belgian Endive leaves
Clam Fritters with cocktail sauce
Guacamole
Hummus
Curried Onion Relish
Red Pepper Mousse
Salsa Fresca/Salsa Verde
Spiced Mango Chutney
Olive Tapenade
Wild Mushroom and Goat Cheese Strudel with Madeira sauce

The strudel was the best thing we did. The sauce was out of this world, and I could have just drank it...which, at one point, several of my classmates and I were doing. It was like "want a little strudel with your sauce?"

The blue cheese and red pepper mousses were okay...the blue cheese one got a little salty, but it looked very good. And it was incredibly easy to do. Mousse is French for "froth" or "foam," and it should be light and smooth. We were quizzing Chef on the difference between mousse and mousseline, and the nearest definition we could come to was, for our purposes, mousseline usually involved ground/pureed meat that is cooked and chilled and then put into something else.

Blue Cheese Mousse in Endive leaves (makes 1 pound of mousse)

Ingredients

10 oz Blue cheese (If you don't like blue cheese, you can substitute the same amount of goat cheese...you could use herbed goat cheese as well)

6 oz Cream cheese

1 tsp Kosher salt

.25 tsp Ground black pepper

6 fl oz Heavy cream, whipped to soft peaks

Small endive leaves (or you could use toasted baguette rounds, etc.)

Procedure

1. Purée blue cheese and cream cheese until very smooth. Season with S&P.

2. Fold whipped cream into the mousse until well blended, without lumps. Chill for 15 minutes or so--don't let it get too hard, because you want to put it in a piping bag.

3. Use a piping bag with a smallish tip--not too small, but not a giant one, either, or you can spoon it into a plastic bag and cut the corner off. Pipe a nice line down the endive leave, sort of squiggle it to make it look pretty. Chef Pantry says he sometimes garnishes these with a candied walnut or pecan, which would give it added flavor, texture, and color. Or, you can use it as a dip.

The key when making this type of hors-d'oeuvre is to take into account the climate of the area you are going to serve it in...i.e., not at an outdoor wedding reception in July at 95 degrees, because it would just melt and wilt and look damned ugly. (Although, anyone who has an outdoor wedding reception in the South in the summer deserves whatever might melt and wilt and look damned ugly. Then, they truly would be the hors-d'ouvres from hell. I can see having your guests wilt for the 15 minutes it should take for the ceremony in the lovely botanical garden or in Great Uncle Willie's hay field where you had so many memories as a child, but for the love of Pete, get the guests inside soon! And, double the amount of liquids (punch, water, tea), nay triple! the amount of liquid you plan to serve, or you'll be sorry!)

The red pepper mousse involved gelatin, which can be tricky to work with, and to be honest, it was pretty bland. It looked pretty, because the team that made it piped it onto chilled spoons, which gave it some visual interest. I think the spoonful type hors-d'ouvres are kinda neat, but I always think about the poor schmoe who will have to wash all those spoons...some poor schmoe like a culinary student who has to slave away for hours at some volunteer gig.

On today's schedule is the written part of our mid-term and some hot appetizers. From the recipes we were given, there was a lot of seafood--crab cakes, Clams Casino, Oysters Diamond Jim Brady--so, I hope we get to do all the good stuff.

Pancakes in Space

It's a damn fine thing that I don't have any aspirations to be a breakfast or brunch cook, because the stress would kill me. I'd have better luck joining the astronaut corps.

Yeah, yeah, it's just eggs, and it's just pancakes, but Lord a'mighty the stress and the agony I went through to produce 6 regular pancakes and 6 silver dollar ones has taken veritable years off my life. Years!!

If you really want pancakes, go here. Some of the best pancakes on the planet and their bacon is the bestest. Or, just buy a box of Bisquick or Hungry Jack...trust me, it saves wear and tear on your blood pressure.

For the second half of the practical, we had to make 3 omelets: 1 French style/rolled with filling, 1 French style/rolled with cheese and filling, and 1 American style with cheese. Then, the aforementioned pancakes from hell. Nothing to it, right? Right.

We have a guy in our class who was a transfer student from another culinary school somewhere in the Midwest. He's currently working as a breakfast line supervisor for a hotel, but because of the way transfers are set up, he has to take x% of classes at Fine Technical College to get his degree. So, he's got to take Pantry and maybe something else before he can get out. And, while it sucks for him to re-take something he's already had, it's a boon for us, because he can really cook omelets! (And, he will henceforth be known as the Omelet King!) He was even nice enough to bring in some omelet pans from work that we could us to take our practicals with, because the ones at school look like they've been run over by a truck. (Evidently, he had to make many promises and give bribes to get the guys at work to lend out their pans.) Personally, I think it made all the difference in the world. On Monday, I turned out a perfect French omelet, one with no color (i.e. browned), good shape, texture, and flavor. Today, I did my French with filling and American with cheese just perfectly, then...I switched pans.

I had thought the pan I was using was a bit small, so there was a slightly larger one available and I decided to try it. Bad. Idea. Just bad. It was like night and day from the other pan. It heated faster and browned my last French omelet. I mentioned it to the Omelet King, and he confirmed that it was a bad idea to switch pans...sort of the go with what you're used to, don't change horses in midstream approach.

Then, I had to do pancakes. I had put it off as long as possible, but the hour of pancake reckoning was upon us...actually it was 1 hour to go before we had to start clean up. Surely, I could make 12 pancakes in a hour...surely. I mean, how long could it possibly take?

Let's try 57 minutes.

I had kind of figured out the ingredient measurements for the batter by essentially halving the recipe we had...figured that would give me enough for many trial runs. Well, in the fine print on the practical test page, it said "scale by 18." Ack! Math!! Cold Sweat!! I was sort of gobsmacked by that idea, and was kind of at a loss as to how to begin. (Remember math = not strong suit!)

Then, out of the corner of my eye, I see something white fluttering...it's the Chiclet, and she's sort of scooting a paper over to my side of the table...a paper with calculations on it. Out of the corner of her mouth, she says "try this. I think it's right." (Obviously, the fear of math is rolling off me in waves...plus, she was an engineering student in a previous life.) I'm mumbling back, "why can't I just halve the damn thing?! That should give me enough and then some." She points out that we might get counted off if we have too much batter left over. Point taken. I'll try her calculations.

A few weeks ago, when we made pancakes during class, she taught me a nifty trick about measuring the ingredients...and we only had to half the recipe then. Basically, we figured out the measurements and totalled them up so we could sort of do an "add to" measuring on the digital scale. For example (and example only!), if we needed 12 ounces of flour, 4 ounces of sugar, and 1 ounce of baking powder, that would add up to 17 ounces. (It's the higher math that gets me, thank you very much.)
So, we'd measure out the 12 ounces of flour, then add the other ingredients until the scale read 17 ounces total. She said she learned that in Baking class, and it made perfect sense to me.

Except today, we couldn't use the digital scale, because it was AWOL or something. So, I'm trying to eyeball decimal measurements on a spring scale. Then, after I measured everything, and it came close to the proper weight, I realize forgot to put in the baking soda. So, I guesstimate it and crossed my fingers. I then mixed up the batter and stuck it in the fridge to thicken up a bit, which would help my pancakes hold their shape.

When I pulled the batter out of the fridge, it had the consistency of cement. I think something was a wee bit awry with my measurements, no? So, I started pouring in heavy cream and beating it, trying to thin it out some, because in its current state, there was no way I was getting 5 pancakes, let alone 12.

And, the things you find when you Google "pancakes." Like this nifty Pancakes for Jesus pan. Or, we have pancakes in space...well, actually, they're on Venus, but that's in space, right? And, this one that I had almost forgotten about. Runaway pancake, indeed. It is me who should be doing the running away. (Oh, and almost forgot that whole Shrove Tuesday thing.)

All in all, the day turned out pretty okay. I did manage to make 12 pancakes that passed the test, and they tasted pretty good, too. Chef said they were fluffy, had a good texture, and flavor. It's telling when he actually consumes more than one bite, because he's had to eat so many omelets and pancakes for the last couple of days. He even at several bites of my first omelet, too.

Next week is the written part of the mid-term, and then we start on hot and cold hors d'ouvres...yeah! no more eggs, we think. Then, he lets us in on a little secret. The final? It will be a practical, too. And guess what? Eggs will be back! Bwahhhaaaahhaaa!

I may start clucking soon.

Pantry Raid!

Pantry Practical today! Whoot! You can tell it was exciting, can't you?

This practical is a wee bit different than the ones we've had in the last couple of classes. For starters, we actually got to use the recipe worksheets we had typed up...yes, actual recipes and the procedures. What's up with that? Could it be...an actual break?

Next, the exercise itself is over 2 class days, and half of us are doing one part of the practical, then we switch to the other half.

Today's half assignment was make 1 pint of mayonnaise, 1 pint of red wine vinaigrette, 4 poached eggs, and a rolled/French-style omelet. Let's just say that I rue the day that I ever thought making mayonnaise was cool. Rue, I tell you, rue it. I think I have an actual blister on my right index finger from gripping the stupid whisk. Who knew that cooking was such a dangerous sport? Oh, wait...there are the knives, aren't there? Hmmm....

The kicker in all this, and you knew there was one, is that we only got 18 eggs total to last us the 2 days. On Wednesday, I have to make 2 omelets and 12 pancakes--6 regular size and 6 silver dollar size. So, not a whole lot of wiggle room.

The egg count at the end of the day today was 9 left for Wednesday. I started with 15 regular eggs and 3 pasteurized eggs (for the mayo). I only used 2 of the pasteurized ones, so I have a spare if needed. My poached eggs turned out 75% okay...there was one egg that just fell apart as soon as I put it in the poaching liquid. Chef said it might have something to do with the age of the eggs, because the older the egg is, the less it wants to set up properly. It goes all rebellious on you...kind of James Deanish with a jacket and a cigarette dangling from its lip...if eggs had lips, that is. And, being the paranoid ninny I am, I opted to go with 3 good poached eggs and one crap one rather than use another egg in a poaching attempt, because...what if....what if I need that egg on Wednesday? And the world could end tomorrow, Chicken Little.

Wonder of wonders, the mayo actually became mayo. It still wasn't as good as Mother Hen's was last week, but it wasn't too bad. Chef said it had a good consistency. The vinaigrette wasn't too bad, either...could have used more salt, which seems to be the story of my life.

Enough whining about that crap, let's get to the really important part: the French-style omelet...which was freakin' perfect! No color (i.e., no browning of the eggs), it was properly rolled so you could see 3 layers when you cut into it, and it tasted pretty yummy, too. Take that, Waffle House!

The Chiclet had some real problems with her poached eggs, and I think she may be short an egg or two for Wednesday. I can give her my spare, I think, if she needs it. It's weird during practicals that we aren't supposed to really work with each other, because she and I are so used to working as a team. I must admit that we both scaled some ingredients for the other just from force of habit. Either Chef didn't notice or he realized it was unintentional, because he didn't say anything to us. It wasn't a great plenty of anything, so I don't think it could really be called cheating. Besides, if we've not learned how to measure ingredients properly, then there are many more things wrong than measuring someone's dry mustard for her.

Wednesday's class is going to be great fun...the pancakes will be the death of me in that practical, I know. For some reason, I couldn't make the damn things turn out right when we made them before. It's just pancakes--not rocket science, and I know something about rocket science, and that stuff is hard!

So, guess who's coming to dinner tomorrow night? That would be this lovely lady--Mrs. Butterworth should be stopping by for a visit. Which brings us to the whole syrup controversy that seems to swirl around on (or off) my plate. Personally, I am not that much of a syrup fan. To me, pancakes are a delivery mechanism for as much melted butter as can be soaked into their little browned pores. Syrup, schmyrup...who needs it, if you have enough butter? Every once in a blue moon, I like to put honey on them after I've drowned them in butter...and it must be orange blossom or some other type of flowery honey. I despise, with a capital D, clover honey. Ulee's Gold, it is not. And, The Chiclet? She likes to put sugar on her pancakes, white granulated sugar.

Confession time: I decided to drop the Banquet class. I know, I know, I'm only putting off the inevitable, but it really wasn't making me a happy culinarian. The class dynamic was just weird and had the tendency to get ugly in that Mean Girls kind of way, and hell, I'm an adult now. I don't have to eat all my peas if I don't want to, and I don't have to hang out in situations that make me uncomfortable either. Plus, it was cutting into my work time--going to school 4 days a week from 12:00 - 4:30 puts the big kibosh on any kind of work schedule. Next quarter, I think I can line up my classes a little better and catch up a bit.

Eggs over and out!