Center of the Plate- Thursday 9/3/09

Hey ya'll! Why didn't I blog on Thursday? I really don't know. My bad. Anyway, so class was good. And I actually got to work with people that were willing to work, and i got to do something other than make sauce! We worked with beef. I THINK it was beef tenderloin. I think. My group made steak fajitas! It was DELICIOUS! If we had enough time, it would have been even MORE delicious. I had to take off the silver skin and cut up the steak, then make the rub. The rub had garlic that I chopped up, salt, pepper, cumin, and onion powder i believe. I rubbed it all on the meat, and put it in the fridge to marinade for about 20 mins. The recipe in my book said 1 hour, but we didn't have time. So, then while that was marinading, I put some water to boil for rice. Put the rice in with a bit of salt, and then about 10 mins before the rice was all done, we put in some fresh cilantro that my classmate chopped. For those of you who know what Chipotle is (the best burrito place EVER) that is what is in their rice... cilantro. So when the meat was done marinading, I put it on the griddle with sliced onions and red bell pepper. It didn't take long, maybe about 10 mins. We only had 2 tortilla's though, so my classmate cut them into 6 beautiful small tortillas. My other classmate that I was working with made pico de gallo. So yes, we had a good night! 

Well folks, I'm off. We are going up to Cripple Creek in a little while and staying the night. I'm excited! Wish me luck that I win big! Or at least win SOMETHING lol!

Center of the Plate- Tuesday 9/1/2009

Hey ya'll. Sorry I didn't blog about my class last night. I was so dead tired! Class was kind of disappointing because we were doing pasta. The groups made homemade pasta. My group made mushroom ravioli. I love mushroom ravioli. But I can't tell ya'll how to make it because I had nothing to do with it! I spent the entire class making a basic cream sauce. I started out making a small batch for my group. Then my chef asked me to make a batch for the whole class. That was not quite as easy. Instead of making it with 4 TBSP of butter, 4 TBSP of flour, and 2 cups of milk, I used 16 TBSP of butter and flour, and 8 cups of milk. That much has to cook a lot longer in order to get the floury taste out. It was very close to being a success by the end of the class. So since I had to stay and stir the sauce almost constantly, I didn't get to be involved in making the pasta. So that was a disappointment. And in the end, the rest of the class didn't use my sauce because it took the entire class period to cook it! So now it's just sitting there, in the reach in fridge, all lonesome and unused. Hopefully tomorrow I will get to do something productive. I will hopefully blog about class tomorrow. But if I am too tired (cooking wears a person out!) I will blog Friday. 

Center of the Plate- Thursday 08/27/2009

Hey ya'll! Well tonight we had a potato lab! A lab is when we cook. Some nights we will not be in the kitchen, it will just be lecture. But most nights we will be cooking! Tonight was kinda hard. I agreed to be the partner of a girl that didn't do much. That was quite a mistake. I did ALL of the cooking while she leaned on the prep table and took 5 minutes to slowly peel a potato. If you can't work quickly, or at least TRY, then why are you going to school for culinary? Just wondering! Anyway, we started to make scalloped potatoes, but we had to evacuate the building because of a possible electrical fire while they were in the oven. Everything was ok though. Didn't get to finish the scalloped potatoes, so I will try and finish them on Tuesday. But, I can tell you how we did it!

First I peeled 6 potatoes russet while she peeled one. Then I clarified butter. At the same time started the Bechamel Sauce. I put a half gallon of milk to simmer with an onion pique (half an onion with a bay leaf tacked to it with about 5 cloves) in it. While that simmered for about 20 mins, I clarified the butter. I set the butter aside while I tried to speed up the milk/onion pique process. I weighed 4 ounces of flour. I set the butter down and my partner started putting the flour in it. Mind you, the plan was to make a roux for the sauce. So luckily I saw her and took the pot to the stove and put it on the heat and saved the roux! Chasity to the rescue! I made the roux with the clarified butter and flour, then added the hot milk to it (took the onion pique out first, of course!) while whisking profusely (did I even use that correctly?). Then I brought it to a boil and them simmered it for about 20 mins (it said 30, but working pretty much alone, I had to speed it up a bit.) While I was doing all this, my partner managed to slice the potatoes. Not using a mandoline, but a knife (a mandoline looks like a grater, it buts the potatoes evenly.) So, I had to work with botched potatoes. But they were potatoes none the less lol! After the sauce was done, I poured about half of it into a bowl and mixed the potatoes in it, then spreaded them out in a buttered hotel pan. I poured the rest of the sauce on top of the potatoes and put em in the oven. It said cover it for 30 mins at 350, then uncover and cook for 30 to 40 mins. Well, again, we did not have an abundance of time, so I put them in at 400. After about 25 mins, I took the parchment paper off (that's what I covered it with) and re-set the timer for another 25 mins. That was when we had to evacuate the building. So, that's the end of THAT one. 

We also made a potato hash with purple potatoes. 

 We peeled some purple potatoes. I had never had them before, but they were pretty darn good. I chopped up a half of a large onion, and the sous chef (we have a sous chef in each class. Just a classmate helping out for the day, instead of actually cooking) She chopped up a green bell pepper. My partner again chopped, and by "chopped" I mean botched, the purples. I heated some oil in a frying pan and put the potatoes, onions, bell pepper and salt and pepper TT. Sauteed them for about 20 mins until the taters were tender. They turned out really well. And the best part is, after my partner was supposed to be watching them (but wasn't) and it stuck to the bottom of the pan, she watched them for a few mins until "oh look a puppy!" There was not really a puppy, but I'm trying to get a point across lol! 

Some of the other people did some really cool stuff. One group made sweet potato fries. Another group made mashed potatoes with the purple potatoes. That was COOL! It was just purple mashed potatoes! It was neat! One group made french fries, I think, and maybe waffle fries or potato chips?? They were small, so maybe tater chips. Not sure. 

Anyway folks, I'm tired. Gonna be off to bed soon! Tune back in on Tuesday night. I figure a set schedule for a couple of night per week would be better than periodically, here and there, never knowing when! Good night! 

Gonna try something new!!!

Hey ya'll! I am gonna try something new now! I am back in school, and taking a culinary class. So, what I'm gonna do, is on Tuesday and Thursday nights, I'll blog about what I made in class! I will blog tonight, but post it in a separate blog! I will be posting pretty late because my class goes til about 9 pm mountain time. I am SO tired! Alright, I'll go blog now :). 

Those Late Night Chocolate Chip Cookies from 7/29/09

Hey ya'll. I made those cookies again. But this time I took a pic of them! They were yummy!

Part of the kitchen

Hey ya'll. I took a few pics of some of the kitchen (stove area). Pic 1: spice rack (missing a few shakers) and knives, most of them are in the dishwasher lol!
Pic 2: Wine, salt and pepper shakers, and some of the big utensils.
Pic 3: The dutch oven. It used to be my Granny's. It's been around for a while. And you see the other cast iron skillets.

Grilled Steak! 08/10/2009

Hey ya'll. This one's a bit late! I made this on 08/10/2009. But, at least I'm posting it! It was great. Nothing like grilled steak!

Seasoned the steaks with salt, pepper, TC, seasoning salt and garlic powder, on both sides. Pour a little bit of olive oil on the steaks (just enough to get em wet). Rubbed it all together. Put it in a tupperware bowl (one that the steaks fit in perfectly), put the lid on tightly and shook it up, to make sure it got all over the steaks. Marinaded them for one hour. Heat the grill, put em on, and grill about 5 mins on each side. I also sauteed some green beens, cooked some egg noodles and put garlic butter on them. I added a few cherry tomatoes to the plate as well.

It was yummy. Well folks, enjoy! Goodnight and good eating! :)