Seafood ID and Fabrication day 7 (final day)

Was it really already day seven, I could not believe that this would be the last time I would have to wake up at 4 in the morning. It was exciting, sad and reality was setting in that I had three different finals in that class. I was getting extremely nervous as expected. I was also super excited for this day because it was Caviar day where we would get to try about 11 different roe from the fish we had learned about in Seafood ID and fabrication. My chef told me that the plates would probably be about $80.00 worth of caviar that we were eating. I am a very, I guess you could say an exotic  eater or I am really willing to try anything unlike most of the people in my class. So I ate my entire plate of caviar and saw plates still full of caviar. None the less I ended up eating 5 plates of caviar, so I pretty much just ate 400 dollars’ worth of caviar, it was awesome because I could not let all that goodness go to waste. I was very content. After our tasting it was time to take the first of three tests in my class. This first section was identifying 10 different fish, from the 150 we learned. Along with those ten different fish, each one had four questions to go with it. So it was now a total of 40 questions. We could be asked about the activity level of the fish, where it lived and spawned in the ocean, the proper name for a market order, what knife cut to use, and characteristics of the fish. It was a little stressful to say the least. Finally we had finished the first part of the final and it was time for the math portion, where we had to determine the yield percent of a fish, how much the edible portion and as purchased portion would cost. Pretty much little figures that are very important to the success of an establishment. After the math section was complete we had 35 questions all about things that we had learned in class, it used to be a multiple choice test but that is no longer the case unfortunately. It was a short answer test, which is not my cup of tea. I think I did pretty well on all the different tests in class. I turned in all three sections and went up to Chef, thanked him for a great class and shook his hand and I was out of there. Unfortunately there is no down time between Seafood class and meat ID and fabrication, so after class I went and got lunch then my friends and I went right to the library to do the pre-day one homework for meat ID and fabrication. We had to watch 3 videos, that took about and hour. Then we also had to define 20 key terms and answer 10 study questions pertaining to meat. We then also had to review the power point for day one and already know what we would be talking about for the next day. Last but not least we had to roll up or side towels so they resembled a tenderloin and then we had to practice our knots and ties on the “tenderloin.” This work took quite a long time I finally finished with it all at 9 that night. I was excited going to bed because the next morning I was going to be able to sleep it! Well if you consider 5 sleeping in, but it was better than the last 7 days at 4 in the morning!

Seafood ID and Fabrication day 6

Day 6 was not that exciting to wake up to because it was a Saturday morning and everyone knows that college students need their sleep, but in this case we all said good morning to the dark cold outside world at 4:00am nobody was excited about that. Saturdays class we learned all about crustaceans which included shrimp, lobsters, crabs, and crayfish. This day was also important because we would be reviewing for our three part final. In the beginning of class we had a review of all the fish that we had in the walk in, 10 of the many fish in the walk in would be on the ID portion of the test. Then we had to scale 11 Haddock, which is a fish in the Cod family, then we also had to scale 11 Atlantic Cod. We scaled them because later in the class we would be filleting them. We each got 1 Haddock and 1 Atlantic Cod to fillet and we had a little less than 20 minutes to do it in. Over all the fillets were successful, except on one of my Haddock fillets I accidentally cut out the belly which you will see in the picture the spot missing, and of course I did it just to show you what not to do! Not really but, now I know how to prevent that from happening, so that negative part of class taught me a lesson! After cleaning up the kitchen we went into lecture for three hours and we would be having a tasting in the beginning of crustaceans. Our tasting included; Tiger Shrimp, White Shrimp, white shrimp cooked with shell on, Langoustine, Jonah Crab, Blue Crab, and Lobster. It was all delicious as usual! Lecture was chalked full of a ton of interesting information as usual, but at 11:00am we were all happy to get out of class and go take a lovely nap to recover from getting up at 4:00am. This nap was important because it was Saturday night our only free night of the weekend, so everyone had fun plans that they had to be fully rested for. There was one negative to only having Sunday off this past weekend and that was the fact that normally every other class has Saturday and Sunday to study but we only had Sunday to do that because we had Saturday class, and we all knew that a lot of Sunday would be dedicated to sleep. So we had to figure out a balance of study and sleep fast!

Seafood ID and Fabrication day 5



My Butterfly Cut, Rainbow Trout

 

Black Sea Bass



Tasting in Class





Oysters and Clam I Shucked



 I woke up this morning excited about class today because it was Mollusks day! Specifically Gastropods which include uni-valves and bi-valves. The uni-valves we learned about were snails, conch, and abalone. The bi-valves were clams, oysters, scallops, and mussels. We also learned about Cephalopods; squid, cuttlefish and octopus. I love all of these animals they are delicious if prepared right. I also forgot to mention we do tastings every class on the fish that we learn about, it is awesome we try about 7-13 different ones a day. So today we would be trying all the different Mollusks and I have been telling all my friends how excited I was for today, they all just say yeah it's not that exciting to eat 3 different raw oysters and 1 raw clam at 6 in the morning. Well I will have you know I enjoyed every minute of it! We had to shuck southern, northern and western oysters, one of each, and then one clam. Shucking the oysters was not as hard as I thought, you just have to use some elbow grease! After shucking them we ate them off the half shell, I thought they were delicious, but the faces of everyone else in the class were priceless! A few people ran over to the sink and rinsed their mouths out instantly, a few spit it right back into their napkin and others just gave the face that they clearly were not enjoying them. Some of the people in my class felt sick after, it was quite funny because the Mollusks did not bother me at all. Then after cleaning up all the shells, we had to fabricate a Rainbow Trout and a Snapper we had to butterfly the Rainbow Trout and fillet the Snapper. It was a good day in the kitchen because I got a compliment on my fillets from someone in my class, and the chef came up to me and looked at mine and said "that looks nice!" that is exciting because rarely does a chef tell you are doing something well but they will definitely tell you that you are doing something wrong, so it was a good day. We then went into lecture for three hours and had a tasting of mussels, Wellfleet clams, Steamer clams, Bay scallops, Sea Scallops, Black Sea Bass and Tile Fish. It was one of the best tasting days yet! We finally got out of class at 11 and then I went with some friends to get food at Cuisines of The Mediterranean kitchen. On the menu they had Kokotxas Saltsa Berdean, which is Cod Cheeks in Green Sauce, it does not sound very appealing and I probably would not have gotten it, but because in seafood fabrication the other day we learned that Cod Cheeks taste like Scallops! So I got that dish and it tasted like amazing scallops with the Green Sauce which was pretty much garlic, butter, parsley and lemon...Can I say it was pure bliss on a plate, it was so delicious! Today was very successful, now it's just time to start my never ending homework. It would be even better if today was actually a regular Friday night but Saturday (tomorrow) I have class at 5:00 am because, we have a day off for thanksgiving and there is no time to actually miss a class here, like I said it is intense!

scallops, oysters, mussels, and clams






Fish I Filleted





Seafood ID and Fabrication day 4

Day 4 was focused on round fin fish and non-bony fish (cartilaginous). All the fish we focused on are as follows; (you don't have to read them all, because I don't want to annoy you with all these fish names but just to give you an idea about all the different fish I learn about daily) Wild Striped Bass, Hybrid Striped Bass, Black Sea Bass, Red Snapper, Vermilion Snapper, Silk Snapper, Yellowtail Snapper, Lane Snapper, Red Grouper, Tile fish, Wolf Fish, Tautog, Weakfish, Catfish, Greater Amberjack, Lesser Amberjack, Pompano, Yellowfin Tuna, Bluefin Tuna, Albacore (Tombo), Skipjack, Bonito, Common Makerel, Spanish Makerel, King Makerel, Mahi-Mahi, Swordfish, Monkfish and Sturgeon. That's 29 different fish in one day...that was a lot. Then we were instructed to fillet aWild  Striped Bass, fillet one Rainbow Trout, and butterfly 2 Rainbow Trout. It was a lot of work to do and we did not have much time, plus Rainbow Trout have tiny pin bones that must be pulled out of each fillet with pliers or tweezers. When I finally finished that task, one of the guys in my group came up to me and said, "wow, those are beautiful fillets." I felt pretty good about that compliment, I guess my fillets were pretty good then, yay! After everyone finished we cleaned the kitchen and went into lecture for 3 hours, and there were a ton of fish to study for that night as I mentioned above. I was not looking forward to homework that night and I had every right not to because after I got out of class I took a 2 hour nap, because naps are needed with these crazy early classes. Then I started homework at 2:30 and did not finish til about 9, not joking! Finally being able to get in bed that night was awesome!

Seafood ID and Fabrication days 2 and 3

On days 2 and 3 we fabricated a few different fish. On day 2 we fabricated a winter flounder and made quarter fillets and whole fillets out of the full fish. Then we also had to fillet a round fish, for this fabrication we used an arctic char and used the straight method of cutting. My fillets came out nicely thankfully! I would have to say my favorite cut is the flat cut, which pertains to a flat fish. Also day 2 was all about the flat fish family. The different types we focused on were the Dover Sole, Winter Flounder, Summer Flounder, Witch Flounder, Plaice, Turbot, Yellowtail Flounder, Rex Sole, Petrale Sole, and Halibut. Imagine having to learn each one of those fish and the activity level for this fish, their characteristics, how to cook them, the flavor profile, health benefits, where they are found, and the fishing techniques to catch them. That is alot of information to learn about for every different fish. That is one of the reasons this class is so intense is because in 7 days we learn up to 150 species of fish and we have to know all those little details about them and be able to identify them if chef holds up one of them. Day three I woke up to a huge thunderstorm at 4:00 in the morning that was quite interesting and scary. I walk outside my dorm getting ready to brave what looked like to be the end of the world, or I might have to run and build an arc. There was wind that was so strong I almost fell over a few times, the rain was pouring out of the sky it was bending my umbrella, and I happen to be walking out when there was three big strikes of lightning and the loudest crack of thunder I have heard in a long time, luckily I made it up to Roth Hall safely! In class on day three we learned about the Cod, Salmon and Trout families. The different fish we learned about in the Cod family were; Atlantic Cod, Haddock, Pacific Pollock, Cusk, White Hake and Silver Hake (Whiting). In the Salmon and Trout family we focused on Atlantic Farm-Raised Salmon, Pacific King Salmon (Chinook), Coho Salmon, Sockeye Salmon, Pink Salmon, Chum Salmon, Whitefish, Rainbow Trout, Brook Trout, Steelhead Trout, Arctic Char, Brown Trout, Golden Trout and Cutthroat Trout. We then learned about different ways of farming these types of fish. For fabrication that day we filleted a Pike fish and Rainbow Trout, those fillets were also a success! So just to give you an idea in those two days we learned roughly, 31 different types of fish, and pretty much have to know them by the next class because when we go into lecture the next class we are quizzed on those fish from the previous day. The chef goes around the room and we have to pick questions off a jeopardy board, he then gives us a certain amount of time to answer it and if you don't answer it in that time, you get it wrong and it moves on to the next person. Also if you just get it wrong, well it's a point off your grade for the day so it is in your best interest to study and review the night before. I spend about 5 or more hours on homework a night. It's intense but I have learned so much about fish already it's insane!

Seafood ID and Fabrication day 1

When you start at The CIA you are required to take B block, which is where you learn Introduction to Gastronomy, Product Knowledge, Food Safety, Mathematics and writing for 6 weeks. If you pass those classes you can proceed on to C block which is Seafood ID and Fabrication and Meat ID and Fabrication. Both classes last 7 intense days, 6 hours a day, so in 14 days you have learned a ton about meat and seafood. Yesterday I began Seafood ID and Fabrication. This class is scheduled to began at 5:30am, that is not to bad except you are required to be to class 30 minutes before hand to set up demos for the day, which then makes it 5am and I need plenty of time to get ready so I set my alarm for 4:00 am.  I am not normally a morning person so the idea of getting up that early was not exactly appealing.  Monday morning I was finally able to wear my chef whites, it was exciting putting on the perfectly pressed white jacket with my name embroidered on it with a green thread, the black and white checkered pants and my toque. The walk up to Roth Hall (the main building on campus) was pretty awesome, even though it was dark outside and freezing, I couldn't help but think about how many great, influential people did this exact same walk in the cold to a room that would be even colder and have a great fish smell that would definitely wake you up! I get to class and we start to work right when we set foot in the kitchen. Everyone thinks they understand what they have been instructed to do...except for the obvious confusion on every ones face because everything we are instructed to do is very vague.  When we all ended up in the walk in together asking each other, what the heck we were supposed to be doing it was clear we needed to figure out what our TA (teacher assistant) had just told us fast or we would get in big trouble. Not to worry we figured out our jobs and did not get in trouble! Our chef came in promptly at 5:30am he did his little introduction and told us straight up that he was a "ball busting hard ass bastard" excuse the language but I thought it would be important for you to see exactly what I would be dealing with for the next 7 days. He told us that he has also been called "el diablo blanco" for those who don't know, that means the white devil, I was a little worried for the next few days to come. For the most part the first day was about getting to know the walk ins, the storage rooms, and how the kitchen should look for demos, class and when all cleaned at the end. We did get to learn about some species of fish though, specifically salmon, trout, bass, cod, flat and some miscellaneous fish. After the demos in the kitchen we went into a classroom for lecture around 8:30am so we had lecture for about two and a half hours where we learned everything about each fish such as; where it's from, it's activity level, what knife cut you are supposed to use on the fish, it's color, texture and a lot of other important little details. Class finally finished at 11:00am and I was exhausted but glad that I survived the first day! Our homework included watching a video about blue fin tuna, defining key terms and answering study questions.
--If you are interested in watching the video about the blue fin tuna I am posting the website so you may view it if you would like. It is an amazing fish that is sadly being over fished, but the video is very interesting and full of very informative facts. Enjoy.. http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=4423723n