Late and Heart Attack on a Plate

I was late for the first time today. Not happy about that. However, Chef Sandra, who is Chef Bruno's teaching associate and is teaching the class while Chef Bruno is in Las Vegas for some training, gave me all my points. Thanks, Chef Sandra. Still, I did not like being late and I will need to make sure it doesn't happen again.

Today, Chef demonstrated how to clarify butter and also showed us that, if you heat it too much, you might as well make gi*, an even more clarified butter except more brown in color. From there, compound butter was made. Let's just say Chef Sandra likes strong, strong flavors.

Next: more mother sauces; yesterday, she showed us veloute and Bechamel, and secondary sauces you can make from them: Sauce Supreme and Mornay, respectively. Today, it was Hollandaise. Yum. She made what I would consider an "enhanced" Hollandaise by also adding an herb-infused white wine reduction. From there, she made a Bearnaise (add tarragon, according to Chef). Yes, we got to try them, over an English muffin and some Canadian bacon; with the Bearnaise, she made poached eggs. They were pretty strong but tasty.

Next, mayonaise! I've never had anyone serve me personally-made mayo before. I'm sure I've had in-house mayo at restaurants, but this was the first time someone made a batch of mayo and I tasted it fresh. Chef likes her salt! It was a strong mayo. We then tried a batch of pesto she made earlier (damn spicy with the garlic!) before she had us taste them combined: pesto mayo!

Tomorrow, knife skill practice and a test of equipment names.

Before school started, but after I'd already enrolled in Le Cordon Bleu, Sacramento, I got a (late) call from the Art Institute. One of the arguments the admission manager (as she called herself) told me was that they get a lot of transfer students from Le Cordon Bleu because the program wasn't what they were looking for, stating that LCB has a lot of book learning.

I can only imagine what they're learning over at the Art Institute if they skip the "book learning", because, so far, our books are helping us to learn some fundamental things like kitchen structure, the history of the modern kitchen, food safety and sanitation, basic procedures, etc. The Art Institute supposedly concentrates more on the artistic side of food, which is fine, but I'm pretty happy with my books. I feel like I'm getting an actual education instead of being taught how to play with my food.

Maybe that last statement isn't fair to say. After all, I didn't visit the Art Institute, and I am certainly not taking any classes there so I don't know what their actual curriculum is like other than whats described on their website. But, if the admissions manager told me there's less emphasis on book learning at the Art Institute, then I do have to wonder if the basics are being taught through pure lecture or maybe taught along the way.

I can safely say, however, that I like my books.

*update: 12-22-2010 - "gi" is actually spelled "ghee". I didn't find that out until later...