Today was somewhat of an interesting day for me, I started the day out with dressing super warmly for the frigid day to come. It was suppose to be a high of -22 degrees Celsius. So after showering and getting dressed, I went to get some breakfast and wait for Josh to come pick me for up for school. Since I had such a great day Monday, I was hoping that today would be great as well. We get to school quite quickly, faster than the amount of time it normally takes us to arrive. I guess since I didn't have too far to walk I didn't really feel as cold as they said it would be. Got to the change room, said hi to a few people and quickly got dressed. I hurried upstairs to get a good seat in class, usually if your one of the last ones to show up in front of the door, you'd end up sitting in the back. We all get into the room and the first thing that we see is a whiteboard already full of information and new words that we had no clue what they meant. When class started, the chef told us that we were on a very tight schedule since he had to teach us four different kinds of Pâte à tarte. (which is Pie dough in French) The four pate a tarte that we learned were pâte brisée, pâte sucrée, pâte sablée and pâte à fonçer. The chef also told us that the one dish that we would be doing in practical would be a quiche, which is made using the pâte brisée. When the chef was showing us how the four different types of dough were made, it seemed somewhat simple. Pretty much follow the measurements listed and do exactly how the chef showed us how to do it. Since it seemed so easy, I felt very confident in redoing this quiche during the practical class. Class actually dragged on longer than the normal two and half hours, we stayed for almost three and left us with only about 15 minutes to get to the next class.
After rushing around, grabbing my knife kit, my apron, towels and scale, we started practical class. Something that wasn’t done before was that the chef randomly called someone to go up to the front of the class and tell everyone what we were doing for the day, I was lucky enough to be called up. It was kind of a shocker to me, just randomly being called up to explain what were going to be doing. I tried my best to remember all the steps and all the different French terms associated with what we were doing. To my luck I didn’t remember every thing; I was also quite nervous and shaking a bit. Not that I have a problem with public speaking or anything. Afterwards for me it went pretty smoothly, since I’m somewhat familiar with the kitchen and how I should be doing what I need to do. I lay out what tools I needed for the day and went about to grab my ingredients and bowls. Thus I started to make the dough for the quiche, at first it was alright following the measurements and I started to sabler (to rub flour and butter gently together for it to mix) it. Then after sabler, we have to add the egg and some water to the mixture before really fully mixing it. This is where everything went wrong, my dough wasn’t doing what it was suppose to, I most likely miscalculated the amount of ingredients I needed. I got a bit frustrated about the fact that it wasn’t going the way it should, I asked the chef for help a few times. I finally finished the dough and popped it into the fridge to let the dough rest before I could do anymore. While I waited for that, doing the rest was somewhat easier than making that dough, this part I know I didn’t mess up at all. When the dough was ready, I took it out so I could abaisser (to lay down the dough and roll out) the dough. This process didn’t go too well, since my dough wasn’t really made 100% correct, it didn’t roll out like it should have. This is where I somewhat got discouraged, I had asked the chef for help again and asked if I should restart the dough. But by then there wasn’t too much time left for me to redo it and let it rest. So I had to use the parures (scraps or leftovers of whatever you are working with) of someone else to finish up the quiche. Because I had to do that, it pushed me back way back and killed some my precious time. I continued to work and decided to move onto cutting the lardon (bacon), again lucky me there was only a small piece of lardon left and it wasn’t a great piece. So I tried my best to do what I could without bothering the chef to get more (which I regret now, I should have asked the chef to get me some so I could have done a better job). Time keeps going on and on, I finally pop in the quiche with the sautéed lardon and the filling. Some of the stress was relived when I completed it, but I still had to try to quickly make a side dish to go with the lardon. This didn’t bother me too much since it was something the chef randomly wanted us to do. Even though the quiche was cooking away in the oven, it still worried me, I looked at the time and it was really cutting it close. I learned from Friday that you should always have something plated, even if its half cooked or half done, having something is better than having nothing at all. Since time was cutting close, I started to panic a bit and pretty much forgot about the timing on my quiche. I wasn’t even sure if it was done yet, or over cooked or what, turns out when I pulled it out it was a bit over cooked and almost became scrambled egg (which is a bad thing for a quiche).
After being rushed by the chef to hurry and plate the quiche I had, I stood in line to await my turn to get feedback on the quiche. Finally my turn had arrived, before the chef could speak, I told him look this is what I know I did wrong. He said ok; tell me what were they and what could you do to improve. I said I’d make sure to watch the measurement levels and practice cutting my lardon in the right size (which was a bit smaller than what was expected). I was somewhat expecting him to be disappointed in me and give me some kind of disappointed look. He was a bit relived that I knew what had gone wrong and what I should do to fix it, but he was still disappointed that I had messed up. I guess I’m a bit discouraged with all the things that happened today, but as the chef said, we’re all going to be making mistakes even up to the last week of class. I took what he said and somewhat reinsured myself and boosted my morale. When I think about it now, all I can really do is try harder, ask more questions and of course practice practice practice till my fingers fall off
Looking at this blog post now, I’m seeing how its really really long, I kind of feel bad for some of you readers. Hopefully those who know me don’t kill me for writing a short story hehe. <3 you too oddball <3 !
The chef's Pate Pantin, which look so yummy!
The chef's Flammiche au Maroilles et aux poireaux
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