Staying Organized

Planning for today's kitchen work began early, as I found myself wide awake at 1:00 am, thinking about dessert plating. Eventually, I got up and made two lists. The first was of the items I'll be making to fulfill this week's assignments: "cinnamon ice cream with individual tarte tatin; middle eastern custard with cardamom butter cookies; vanilla panna cotta with citrus strawberry salad; crepes suzette with bananas and pecans." The second list was today's To Do list: "Make cinnamon base. Make custard. Make panna cotta. Make cardamom cookie dough. Make citrus salad. Serve crepes?" Then I went back to bed.

And the day pretty much unfolded as planned. First, Chef Judy discussed baked custards, gelatin, and churned frozen desserts. I learned that I'd been harboring a misconception about the purpose of scalding (usually milk) before incorporating it into a recipe. I thought the scalding was related to bacteria reduction, and was now unnecessary in these days of ultra-pasteurization. I don't know where I got that idea — I'm sure I read it somewhere. But really, warming the milk helps to hasten the overall cooking process, keeping all the ingredients going in the same direction, temperature-wise.

Half the class churned their ice creams today, including three people who volunteered for "Guinness" duty. Ostensibly because of the upcoming Saint Patrick's Day holiday, Chef Judy obtained two six-packs of Guinness beer in bottles, and she brought in three different recipes for Guinness ice cream. I only tasted one of the batches, after Derrick churned it. The beer flavor was very subdued, mostly as part of a malty finish. The ice creams must freeze overnight before they're served, which apparently helps "cure" the flavors, so it'll be interesting to try it again later this week, along with the other varieties. Dava made hers with soy milk.

My cinnamon ice cream base went together easily, especially since I "practiced" it yesterday. Once it was safely in the walk-in, unadulterated, I made the two custards. The middle eastern one, based on a recipe by Joyce Goldstein, has cardamom and rosewater in it. It baked in a bain marie for about an hour, then I refrigerated it until tomorrow. The panna cotta is made with gelatin, and I used sheet gelatin for the first time. You soften it in cold water, then add the whole floppy transparent sheet to your liquid ingredients. We learned today that gelatin melts at 86 degrees, and sets at 68 degrees, so you have a range of only 18 degrees to get the mixture into its container(s) before it begins to gel. I poured mine into triangular silicone molds, then put them into the freezer until tomorrow. They'll thaw slightly before presentation.

I've made the cardamom cookies several times before, and they seem appropriate as an accompaniment to the middle eastern custard. So I made the dough, then wrapped them up to be baked and decorated tomorrow.

By this time, it was only about 9:45, so I knew I'd have plenty of time to present the crepes to the Chef. I started a sauce by caramelizing sugar, keeping an eye at the same time on the pecans I was toasting in the oven. (Chef Judy believes that nuts can only be properly toasted in the oven, as opposed to Chef Duffy, who encouraged us to use a saute pan on the stovetop.) I added orange and lemon zest, orange juice, and butter, then some orange liqueur. I flambéed that briefly to mellow out the alcohol. Then I dipped three crepes into the sauce. I folded them into quarters and arranged them, points up, in a row on a triangular plate. Then I added diced bananas and pecans to the sauce, and spooned it over the crepes. I piped orange-flavored whipping cream above each of the crepes, then stuck in a thin banana slice. Time to serve!

Chef Judy liked it. She ate a teeny bite, then tossed her plastic spoon into a half-full bucket of used plasticware. Her only recommendation was that I could have caramelized or bruléed the garnish bananas, but I still got full points (ten). Today was the first day that she's actually evaluated our dishes and taken off points. During the last two weeks, we basically got points for completion, not style or taste.

I put together a simple orange-strawberry salad to go with the panna cotta tomorrow, then spent about an hour at the dish sink. Andrea brought her tools over for washing, her face a dark cloud. While Chef evaluated her plate (mocha mousse), Jeff stood alongside, providing ongoing unwelcome commentary. "You should have put the sauce on the other side. I would have used some fruit sauce. You should turn the plate the other direction." Andrea glared at him and said, "Don't you have something else to do?" "No," he said. "I'm done." Chef looked him in the eye and said, "Jeff, GO AWAY."

Before I left class today, I reviewed my lists and made one for tomorrow: "Bake cookies. Bake tuile and caramel garnishes. Toast pistachios. Mint? Plate and serve middle eastern custard. Plate and serve panna cotta and fruit salad." Now I won't need to wake up in the middle of the night to get organized.