My Externship Thus Far (AKA: A Long Overdue Post)

A post has been long overdue.  And I know that I owe this blog the second part of my thoughts on rewriting recipes.  But, being as this is the end of my second week of my externship (yes, it's basically the same thing as an internship), I thought I'd document my progress and experience thus far.

For the time being, the restaurant I'm at will remain nameless.  I'm new to the restaurant game and don't want to unintentionally burn bridges.  Let's just say that I'm fortunate enough to have been placed in a restaurant that is run by a celebrity chef, and this chef knows food.  In fact, this restaurant's food is ridiculously good.  Most everything I've tasted is just exquisite.  An overused word to describe food, I know, but it's the word that best describes what I'm thinking whenever I put the food in my mouth.

I am very interested in this restaurant's specialty (which I won't reveal because it's easy to guess what restaurant it is) and I knew I wanted a tough externship.  While the latter didn't really cross my mind when I signed on, I expected an environment of high standards.

And what I got was a pretty intense place.

So intense, in fact, that my first week-and-a-half was spent with me being really stressed out.  My current trainer, the main prep cook, comes across as impatient only because his job is to push me.  This man can do everything there: make bread, pasta, all the meat prep... whatever needs to be done at this restaurant in terms of prep, he can do.  And he expects me, a lowly intern, a person with no professional restaurant experience save for a single day doing appetizers and pizzas at a local Sacramento eatery, to be perfect on the first try.  And to remember every.  single.  thing.  he.  does.  If he shows something me once, he expects me to remember all of the subtleties and steps.  Me being new to this type of work, my observation skills are not exactly keen on all the details, which I hate because I am a details person.  I'm a technical person.  I like methodology.  Once I've got those things down, I can work on making my tasks more second-nature.  Put me in front of a drumline and my observation skills rival those of Sherlock Holmes (yeah, I'm being cocky.  It's for the effect).  But, when it comes to restaurant work, I don't have the motor skills this guy does, he who has been with the restaurant's head chef for nine years.  So, when watching this man make professional pasta with the grace of a ballerina (no joke), it is amazing.  And daunting.  And no, my current set of motor skills don't yet include those types of movements to handle that type of thin, delicate material.  But if I get it wrong, which I did - several times, in fact - I get a contemptuous looks and often a verbal berating.

But it's what they do at this restaurant.  They push.  Everyone pushes.  In fact, last night, he actually, and oddly, apologized for pushing me, but qualified it by saying, "But it's good for you."  I replied, "You're supposed to push me."

It's what's been happening the last two weeks, the last 89 hours of work I've put in so far.  Even the head chef, the celebrity himself, really got on my case the third day in because I was too slow at picking parsley.  And I didn't start my day right, either.  I forgot to change my shoes, something I never do.  I forgot my notepad, something I never do.  And he was not happy.  But, I haven't made that mistake since.

But, when I do a good job, or even an improved job, I do get told.

I have always told my drumline students not to take criticism, harsh or pleasantly put, personally.  It's our job to push.  It's our job to criticize.  It's been a long time since I've been on the receiving end.  I'm usually the guy who's giving it.  Now, it's my turn to take it.  Except that this is so, so much more intense than drum corps was when I marched.  And there was a lot of yelling and cussing, not to mention running and pushups and standing at attention for long periods of time.  Granted, that was many years back so perhaps the memories of that experience have softened, but my current experience compared to my drum corps experience?  The restaurant business, at least the intensity at which this one is run, is a harrowing experience.  My psyche certainly took a lashing.  Perhaps it's because, at the end of the day, paying customers are involved, as is money spent on ingredients.  It's a for-profit business based on volume.

By the end of my second week, I have improved.  I can do certain things with more competency.  I get "yelled" at a little less.  Yes, I still get pushed, and yes, my trainer will still look at me with those big, contemptuous eyes and a snide, ego-pounding remark, but I'm taking my beatings and I know that I'll come out the other end tougher, faster, and more efficient.

I'll post another update at a later date with other observations.  Until then, I need to make sure my return to work after a couple days off starts with me progressing and not regressing.

[UPDATED 10-13-2011]

Now that I'm on school break...

...I can make time to update this thing.

What with everything that's been going on in my life, I have neglected this blog, which is a shame. A lot has happened during my three months in culinary school.

I've completed my Food & Safety, Foundations I, and Foundations II classes, receiving an A in each, which is great. Not the highest grade in my class, which the competitive side of me hates. But, great grades do not make great food, right?

Right.

At times, I wish I'd been able to attend a 2-year culinary school. I don't know what a 2-year program is actually like; I know that there are several management classes that students have to take. I can only imagine that students have more time with actual culinary lessons; instead of spending a single day on, say, fish butchery, I wonder if students in a 2-year program get to spend a couple days learning and improving their skills. Perhaps this is a false assumption, but it is an assumption that stems from being enrolled in what is what one of the chefs has called an "accelerated curriculum".

In Le Cordon Bleu's accelerated curriculum, we learn a lot of things in each 28-day class. In Foundations II, my most recent class, we:

• made stocks, sauces, and soups
• reviewed and applied saute, braising, roasting, grilling, poaching, and even poele
• trussed a chicken
• butchered a chicken and fish
• learned egg, rice, potato, vegetable, and basic protein cookery
• learned about salads
• exercised a line cooking scenario

While, to the uninitiated, this may all seem like basic stuff you can learn at home, I can tell you that a) you're right, and b) you're wrong. With each lesson there are certain techniques employed that is meant to help the cook be more efficient, which you need to be in a professional kitchen. And, with each lesson and recipe, there are what my recent chef instructor called "competencies" - several smaller skills that you learn while making each recipe. Then there's the food science part of it. Salads, for example, may seem easy but within learning about different salads (and there are different classifications), we learned about temporary and permanent emulsions, proper blanching and shocking procedures (according to the chef), basic composition, seasoning (who seasons a salad? Everyone should!), and dressing... little things that most people wouldn't consider but, upon reflection, all make sense now that we've had those lessons.

And, of course, through it all, practicing our basic knife skills every day.

But the problem with the accelerated curriculum is we don't get to spend enough time in school practicing the larger lessons that we've learned. The smaller lessons get practiced almost every day, but the bigger ones are the more difficult ones to learn and become competent at. Of course, I could go out and, for example, buy a whole chicken and butcher it, but it's nice to be able to do it in school so that I can ask questions and get feedback. Thankfully, the logistics of the bigger lessons have been learned and at the very least I can practice at home so that the application side of it becomes more competent.

For our final, we had to make four plates consisting of protein, starch, vegetable, sauce, and garnish (the last item not being too important to our chef). We split the four plates into two days. The first day was Escalope of Veal and mushroom cream sauce with browned, glazed pearl onions, carrots, turnips, and wilted lettuce and a pan fried potato cake, and poached salmon with Beurre Blanc, rice pilaf, and sauteed tourneed zucchini.

During our practice day, the day before, my potato cake came out great. The chef told me not to change a thing. So what happened? During the final, my potato cake basically melted in the pan. Too much butter. What came out were bits of fried potato that looked like hashed browns. I was, obviously, pretty upset. But, the rest of the food was pretty decent and I got a good grade otherwise.

The second day of finals was grilled pork chop with a veal, dijon, gherkin juice sauce (it's good, really) and pureed potatoes (essentially mashed potatoes), and lamb stew with a side of polenta.

I finished my plates for the day in good time and was pretty proud of the way I'd plated everything: I ensured that my sauce didn't run into my potatoes and my stew (with veggies cooked separately - a modern practice) looked great. Then, as I was and one of the end sinks cleaning up, I heard commotion. I looked over and heard, "Whose is it?"

"It's Phillip's."

I came over and my suite mate told me that the student across from us had knocked my plated down from the shelf onto the counted. I looked and my pork chop was flipped off the plate, my sauce was all over, and my potatoes in a slump somewhere next to the chop.

Needless to say, I was pissed.

In the end, the associate chef told me to just show what I had; the chefs knew I'd done the work so all they needed was to taste the food. My first thought was, "Ew." My second thought was, "There's hardly any sauce left." My third thought was, "I'd better not get a bad evaluation or I'm going to flip out."

My pork chop was, essentially, perfectly cooked. Slightly pink in the middle (yes, PINK!) and juicy. The potatoes were good and the sauce, though he couldn't really judge consistency because there wasn't enough, was good; the associate chef, who evaluated my food) could tell all the components were there.

My polenta was good, and the chef really liked the color and flavor of my stew, which was, as he described, a dark, dirty sauce with intense flavor. Excellent. I could've cooked the turnips just a bit longer, but overall my dishes turned out well.

Before culinary school, I really liked cooking. Often, I loved it, especially when I was making something different and made the time to actually cook something substantial (you know, as opposed to eggs and frozen hashed browns for breakfast). Now, I love it more and more. I find that going to culinary school and cooking everyday has really made me love the act of cooking. I find myself wanting to cook at home, even though I spent all afternoon cooking (I can't say the same about the dishes, though).

I still don't know what I want to get out of culinary school other than the ability to get a job that I believe I will like. I don't know if I want to own a restaurant, become a private chef, get into catering, or what. This is one of the few times in my life where I have entered a field without knowing what I want from it in the end. I do know that I want to share my skills with my family and friends, at the very least, and I think my education will help my wife and me to eat better overall.

I'm looking forward to Foundations III, where the chef seems like he'll be a hardass (yes, I'm looking forward to that). Plus, I need to start work on my resume because the time to begin applying for an externship is coming up.

I'm Certainly In School Again

I find myself concerned with grades.

Geez.

It's been awhile since I've had to worry about grades. Since I graduated college 10 years ago, my experience with teaching drums has put a large emphasis on learning for the sake of learning and performing (oh, and competition, too) with no real concern for grades. With drumline and private drum lessons, grades are not a factor and lessons are given with almost pure education in mind. I entered culinary school with this same mind set until points started being given along with quizzes and practical application exams. Argh.

The other thing that reminds me I'm in school is an unfortunate reminder: instead of feeling like I'm attending a culinary "college", I feel like I'm in high school again. I've mentioned this before, but now I know I'm not the only one to be concerned with the students who are both distracting and detracting from the lessons. It's ridiculous, really, and we did mention it to Chef Bruno, who understands our concerns.

Chef Bruno is an extremely nice guy and is very open to his students' questions and comments. He's patient and seems to always have a good attitude about everything. Hopefully he'll be able to address the rudeness in the classroom as we finish up our last week.

My last week will be difficult. I'll be missing school Friday and the following Monday, which means I'll be losing points (which I hate), thus lowering my grade (still with the hate). It also means that I have two reports to turn in early, practical exams to make-up (if necessary; I'm still not sure if the schedule has changed), and a ServSafe test to take the day after the rest of my class takes theirs. This means a lot of studying on my pre-planned vacation. Thankfully, the studying is for a subject that I like.

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...

Week 2 into Week 3

As I go into Week 3 of culinary school, I noticed a couple of interesting things:

1. According to our ServSafe book, people will deliberately attempt to contaminate food, including (number one on the bulletpoint list), terrorists. The page dedicated to purposeful contamination was at once funny and paranoia-inducing.
2. Many culinary students are squeamish about "strange" foods, such as brains and cow hearts. I don't understand this squeamishness coming from any student studying food and the preparation thereof, but I apparently it happens.

I find that I'm pretty good at most of my cuts (Chef Bruno seems to think to), but I still need to get the hang of the tournee, the 7-sided (sometimes 5-sided) football-shaped cut. I will find out this week that I probably failed a conversion quiz because I didn't know about one of two equations I was supposed to use. Thankfully, I know about the formula now which is beneficial in the long term.

Oh, and we got our culinary kit, complete with KNIVES! Woo hoo!

We now have the Internet at the new home. Hopefully, as things get set up here at the house, I'll be able to blog about my experience at culinary school more often.

Culinary School, Week 1

...Day 4.

The plan was to write one of these everyday. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), starting culinary school at Sacramento's Le Cordon Bleu coincides with moving into a new home. Our phone and Internet gets turned off tomorrow, so this blog comes to you during the hours between Day 4 and 5 of my first week.

First up is Food Safety and Sanitation and Culinary Foundations I, both taught to us by Chef Bruno Caccia. We've been given 7 books (!) that will serve as our texts during our entire time at the school. The culinary/knife kit comes next week (supposedly Monday).

It's a little weird; Chef reads the SafeServ book to us. Yes, he also provides his own anecdotes and elaborations, but having been out of high school for 15 years, it's weird to be in a class where the teacher reads the text aloud. As we learn more about foodborne illnesses and prevention measures, I fear the class will do the opposite of what I'd hoped it would do; I'm obsessive-compulsive - a "germaphobe" - and I was hoping that learning about food safety and sanitation in the professional kitchen would help me to realize how far is too far when trying to be clean in the kitchen. So far, my paranoia feels heightened, like Spider-Sense except not as cool.

Day 2 put us in uniform, complete with checks (pants), chef's jacket, white neckerchief , hat, black socks, and slip-resistant shoes. No earrings, though, which meant taking mine out (and losing one). We have uniform inspection everyday, during which we line up in alphabetical order as the chef inspects our fingernails, our shaven (or unshaven) faces, and our uniforms.

Day 2 also saw us jumping right into learning classic knife cuts. In doing so, I became subjected to the confusing world of French culinary terminology. A diced potato, for instance, is called "macedoine", no matter the size. However, a "macedoine" for vegetables, however, is a larger dice, while a smaller dice is a "brunoise" and an even smaller dice is a "brunoisette".

Oh, but wait. There's more. Cutting a vegetable - say, a carrot - into a 1/2" x 1/2" x 2" stick is called a "batonnet". But if you do the same cut with a potato, it's called a "pont neuf". Sigh.

Today, Day 4, I cried in class. It was the onions. Imagine 32 students cutting shallots, garlic, and onions in fairly close proximity to each other. There was a lot of crying and sniffling. I'm surprised I didn't see any ex-newbies watching us through the hall window. It's funny to look out and see students who were probably newbies six weeks ago watching the new newbies as if we were zoo exhibits. I would've expected that today, with all the tears and snot pouring from our faces as the fumes from the onions took their toll, the ex-newbies would have looked in on us, the expressions on their faces saying, "I remember that. Ha. I bet we never looked that funny."

My class is a hodge-podge of people. Some are older, some younger. Some look like they're the pirates described in Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential. Some look like they came from a ghetto. Others from nicer areas. Some have professional kitchen experience. Some, like me, just love food and want to learn. As I look at the faces of my classmates, I wonder how many will quit before it's over and how many will graduate. You just can't tell because the food industry is full of so many different kinds of people and you really can't stereotype what a foodie is supposed to look like or how they're supposed to behave.

Day 5 is up next, then the weekend. Hopefully the major part of the move to our new home goes well and I'll actually have some time to get some homework done.

Orientation at Le Cordon Bleu, Sacramento

On Saturday, 9-18-2010, I had my first official day at culinary school at Sacramento's Le Cordon Bleu. It turned out to be part self-help class, part orientation. I felt like I was five years old until the chefs got up to speak.

I assumed orientation would let incoming students know how to prepare for their first week of school, where to go, what to bring, what to wear, when we'd get our uniforms and equipment. And it was. But a lot of this basic information was preceded by talk of how to deal with your personal issues while attending school; of where to go for support; of encouraging everyone to help each other and to ask for help.

Don't get me wrong. This is all useful information for people that have never worked together in a kitchen before, for people who are changing careers, for people who haven't been to school in years. But delivery is a powerful thing. They way you say it has a lot to do with how one takes it.

And I hate it when people talk to me like I'm five.

I'm mature enough to handle my responsibilities as an adult and to handle myself in public in a manner that, hopefully, isn't embarrassing to me and to those around me. I think I can get that much right. But I'm also immature enough to like potty humor, to watch cartoons meant for kids, and to act like a five-year-old when I'm trying to cute and/or funny. But when administrative members of a school get up in front of a room filled mostly with adults, please don't talk to me as if you're trying to communicate to a five-year-old.

You can use humor. You can as rhetorical questions. It's all fine. I do the same thing when I teach drumlines. I talk about asking for help and helping their peers. I ask for group answers to my questions. I use humor to help get my messages across. But I talk to my drumline members, who are mostly high school students, like young adults. It's less patronizing, which leaves the listener more open to what I have to say.

Thankfully, when the chefs got up to speak, the communication got better. I feel pretty good about entering a classroom and having the chefs talk to my class. School starts in a week and I'm nervous and excited.

I'm looking forward to it.

Let's get something straight about culinary school

Two months from today, I shall be a student once more, this time wearing a chef's jacket and wielding a large knife.

That's right. I took the leap and enrolled in culinary school. I shall be attending Le Cordon Bleu affiliate here in Sacramento for their 12-month Extended Certificate program.

As I await the start date of my new adventure, I want to make a few things clear to the general public - to those thinking about attending culinary school, to those with opinions on culinary schools, and to those with delusions influenced by the food entertainment we see on TV.

1. I have no plans to abandon comics or music. Let's just leave it at that. But I need a job, preferably one that I like. I've already done my time with the job I hate so I can come home and work on the things I love, and it didn't work out so well. I've been thinking of going to culinary school for at least five years, give or take. I always dismissed it as a fleeting dream, something I would save for the age of 35 or so if I wasn't successful in the other areas of my choice. Currently, I'm not unsuccessful. I teach drums and write music for a living. It just doesn't pay very well, and that's gotta change. Like I said, I'm not leaving music behind, but in my search for a dayjob that I like, I revisited the notion of going to culinary school. People, in any economy, continue to go out to eat, yes? I love food and cooking, yes? It seems like a logical choice. While I have no idea what the future will bring, I hope that my acquired skills will help find me a job, which in turn will afford me a comfortable living once again. I understand that working in the food industry will probably mean a commitment of many, many hours and that other things in my life may have to sit in the proverbial back seat, but I'm willing to take that chance for a career that looks like it will satisfy me, both personally and financially.

2. I do not know what will happen beyond graduation besides me seeking employment. I want to try working in a professional kitchen. It looks like fun. It looks like hard work. It looks satisfying, creatively. I could be dead wrong. I won't know until I reach that point. What I do know is that I have no delusions about the glamourous career television makes the professional kitchen out to be. I have no plans to become the next celebrity chef, or the next owner of a national chain of restaurants. I have no plans to become the next guy who will travel the globe eating all sorts of stuff we're no accustomed to in America. Would those things be nice? Sure. I'm prone to daydreaming. But I'm not going into this with those goals in mind. My goal is to learn technique, methodology, efficiency, and ingredient interaction, all of which will help me be better cook. From there, my goal will be to seek employment with my new skills. Where that takes me remains to be seen. I won't know until I have some experience in the field.

3. I will be attending Le Cordon Bleu affiliate in Sacramento. After much research - though, admittedly, there's always more research I could have done - I decided this would be the logical choice. My criteria:

• Money: I don't have a lot of it and I can't take out too much in student loans.
• Time: I can't spend two years in school, as much as I'd like to. There are other things in my life that need attention.
• Location: we can't relocate. We can't afford it. That ties in with the money issue, except in this case relocation would impact my wife. As much as I'd love to check out the Culinary Institute of America or Johnson and Wales, it's not feasible.
• Externship: I want to do one. I want part of my graduation requirements to include working in a real, fine dining restaurant.

There isn't a whole lot of choice here in Sacramento. We've got Le Cordon Bleu, which is an affiliate of the Paris school, but not run by the same faculty. We've also got the Art Institute and the American River College culinary programs. ARC, though I've heard they have a fine program and would be considerably cheaper than LCB or AI, was off the list because an externship isn't part of the program. Instead, students work in the school-owned cafe. This is fine, but it isn't what I want. The program offers a certificate and an Associate's Degree (two years) program, and each program requires students to take classes in hospitality management (food costs, restaurant management, etc). I have heard that people really like the program, but the cooking half of the curriculum didn't seem like what I wanted and the lack of an externship was the deciding factor.

The Art Institute's program also looks very good. Half of it is hospitality management and the other half - the cooking half - looks very appealing as well as diverse. They offer a certificate and an Associate's Degree, and program does include an externship. If I attended this school, I would want to enroll in the two-year program, but that wouldn't be feasible. The one year program would be a good choice, too, but in the end the decision was based on cost... and they want a ton of money.

The Art Institute's total tuition for the diploma (about one year; 5 quarters) is $32,093, and their two-year program is $58,691. I'm not sure what is included (ie. are the application, enrollment, lab, and student activity, and other fees included or separate from tuition?), but if this is the base price to go on, wait until you read about Le Cordon Bleu's tuition.

Le Cordon Bleu has an application fee of $50, which you pay at the time of enrollment. Then, tuition is $18,971 for the 9-month program or $22,380 for the 12-month program. So the Art Institute wants $10,000 more than LCB, and there are other fees that need to be paid on top of that? Yeesh.

Le Cordon Bleu only offers certificates and there are no hospitality management classes, but that means there is a large emphasis on cooking. While it's always good to know the business side of things, I figure I can learn that as I gain field experience or I can take individual classes at American River College. According to the admissions representative, the basic classes (Foundation I, II, and III, Food Safety and Sanitation, and Baking and Pastry) are comparable to the basics curriculum at the Paris school. The extended program, in which I've enrolled, offers three more classes and the earned certificate is issued from the Paris school (the regular certificate is not).

For my money (loaned money) and time, Le Cordon Bleu is the logical choice.

4. An admissions representative from the Art Institute talked with me the other day and she did not seem to hold Le Cordon Bleu's program in high esteem. This was probably part of her job, but since I have no evidence to the contrary, I can only take her words at face value. I did some poking around on the Internet to see if anyone had any opinions about both programs. I mostly found people commenting on Le Cordon Bleu, the CIA, and a few notes here and there about Johnson and Wales.

Without getting into detail, let me say this: I've never known an organization where 100% of it's members were great. I'm sure a lot of incompetent people go to Harvard and a lot of smart people go to California State University, Sacramento. Just because a student attends the CIA, doesn't mean he or she has the makings of a three or four star chef. Just because a student attends a community college program doesn't mean he or she has inferior cooking skills. I'm willing to bet that, no matter where a student goes to school, most of the student body don't work hard, aren't interested in learning, and basically waste the money required to attend their school. It's the relatively small percentage that do work hard and do want to learn that actually have any desirable skills and knowledge after graduation.

I have read statements and blogs from students that have attended other Le Cordon Bleu campuses that have enjoyed their time at the school and learned a lot.

The truth is, I don't know what the school will be like. Any school will teach you something, but you also get out what you put into it. I think there will be a lot to learn by attending the Sacramento campus. I think the curriculum promises a large culinary education. Will they deliver on that promise? As with any school, I'll find out when I start classes.

I can also tell you this: I'm not interested in the actual, paper certificate itself. I'm not interested in any sort of prestige a school may or may not have associated with its name. I am interested in learning and acquiring good cooking skills. Sure, a certificate and a school's name may look good (or bad, depending) on a resume, and that's how the world works, but when it comes right down to it I want a potential employer to assess me for my skills, my knowledge, and my personality, not the name of some school I went to.

* * *

I'm excited for school to begin. I will learn what they have to teach me and I will work hard at being a good cook. We'll see where my adventure in professional cooking takes me from there.