Skills 1

For the past three days I have officially been in a CIA kitchen class! I absolutely love it so far. The class is called skills 1, it is probably one of the most important classes you could take here at The Culinary. You learn all about the 5 mother sauces, knife cuts on vegetables, broths and stocks, pretty much all the building blocks to becoming a great chef. The first day was like any typical day in a new place, we got the tour of the kitchen, where everything belongs, what time we should be there and we were pretty much told that by day 2 we shouldn't be asking where anything is because we should have the kitchen memorized like the home we live in. I was thinking there was no way that was possible but on day two when your stuck in the situation of not knowing where something is and having to complete a task quickly you will some how some way find it yourself because it is much better than having a chef yell at you for asking where the location of an item is. Day 2 we learned about what tasks would be required daily for the next 3 weeks such as; filling the huge kettles with pounds of chicken and beef bones for stock, cutting up 15-22 pounds of Mirepoix also known as the vegetables that go into to stocks to help with the flavor, those veggies being 2 parts onion, 1 part celery, and 1 part carrot. The whole class is a part of preparing the many pounds of mirepoix so its not that bad of a job to have to do daily. After that task is finished we must complete our daily knife trays which includes; 2 onions thin slice 1/8 inch thick, 2 onions small dice 1/4 inch dice, 2 tomatoes each cancasse (aka. shocking the tomatoes so they can be peeled and then diced), 3 cloves garlic minced, 1 shallot minced, small bunch of parsley minced, 1 potato medium dice, 1 potato julienne 1inch long 1/8 inch on each side, brunoise (juliennes diced 1/8 by 1/8 by 1/8 by 1/8), 1 potato battonette (2-2 and a half inches long and 1/4 inch on each side, and last but not least 1 small sachet (these are to heighten the flavor of stocks and broths). That whole knife tray must be completed in an hour, if it is not you don't bother turning it in because chef will not accept it. Also the knife cuts with all the precise measurements must be those measurements and if there not start saying by to your pints for the day because you loose 5 every time they are wrong. That is only this week though next week we will only have 50 minutes to complete the tray, and if any are not the right dimension it is 10 points off each one. By the final week of the class we will have to be able to do it in 40 minutes...yikes! On day 2 we also made beef broth and chicken glace, which is chicken stock reduced. It was a successful day! Today on the third day we did our knife trays I finished in time and once again like yesterday he said my tray looked beautiful, which is great for the chef to tell you because complements don't just get thrown around. Today we had to make our first soup, and first legitimate dish at The Culinary Institute of America, it was exciting and very nerve racking! We each individually had to make vegetable hearty soup. I made my soup and then plated it, I then took the walk up to his tall, white desk and I placed it down in front of him and stepped back a little. He picked up his spoon, took the first bite and to my relief he was very pleased with it! The vegetables had a great texture and had been cooked properly and the seasoning was just about perfect but he said for his taste he likes a little more salt, so a tiny bit more would have been better. I was so happy after hearing those great words come out of his mouth instead of my soup! I don't think I can truly describe how I felt when I got back to my station, it was like I had won the lottery I was extremely happy because this was the first thing that any chef at the CIA would be trying that I produced! I know it seems silly because it was a vegetable soup, but when he adds a time limit and the stress of it being the best thing you can produce and hoping nothing goes wrong you truly feel like you are on top of the world. It is really something one has to experience themselves! Tomorrow is day 4 and we will be completing our knife trays and making French Onion Soup individually. I am excited but of course nervous, but I will let you all know how it goes!