Week Two Begins

Hello all!

I *would* have updated last week, but it was a bit of a CR-A-ZY week, thanks to the wonderful world of SafeServ. 

So glad THAT’S over.

Now just the wait. 

A LONG week of waiting for the results. 

It’s kind of like the ACT or SAT.  It has to be sent to the National Restaurant Association to be graded then the results mailed back in the normal ‘we’ll get it to you when we get it to you’ 7-10 business days.

Did I mention it’s gonna be a looooong week?

In the meantime, Intro to Kitchen and Basic Skills will keep me occupied.  BIG TIME!  Mainly knife skills, which is WAY more difficult then I expected.  We’ll learn 14 basic knife cuts,  the in’s and out’s of a basic kitchen, herb and spice notification, measurement, and to end: Chicken Stock. 

It will also be a first practical exam, which is WEDNESDAY.  Yea—like day after tomorrow.  ACKKKK. 

Anyway, we’ll have to show that we are proficient in the 14 basic knife cuts:

*Tournet      *Large Dice     *Medium Dice    *Small Dice    *Oblique       *Brunoise        *Fine Brunoise    *Rondelle   *Paysanne    *Julienne     *Fine Julienne      *Batonnet   *Minced

And two other’s we haven’t been introduced to as of yet.  I’m gonna guess slicing of some sort maybe. 

Let me just say, these are TOUGH.  Like tough tough!  Most of them start with having to square either a carrot or a potato. 

Yea---it’s not easy.  Go on.  Try.

I can’t even BEGIN to count the number of carrots that were slaughtered in the attempt to cut a perfect Brunoise. 

But at least the carrots are being saved for the chicken stock, the poor potatoes………….

Not so much. 

Talk about WASTE.   Let’s just say it’s I lost count after about 10. 

And that was just in the morning! 

And there are something like 20 in the class.

All I could think about were those ‘poor starving children in Ethiopia.’