Today we prepared foods from Alsace-Lorraine.

This region has been controlled alternately by the Germans and French and the legacy can be seen in the cuisine, which calls Frenchy things by German names and vice versa, offers sauerkraut and sausages as its most famous dish, integrates German beer brewing with French wine making and relies heavily on pork.  If I had to pick one regional cuisine to practice on tothe exclusion of all others, it might be this.  These people know how to preserve.  They use the whole animal.  Great pickles, smoked meats, various charcuterie, the finest jams, as much interest in savory baking as sweet, and reliance on not one or two but three animal fats (goose, pork, butter) to stock their larder. 

(My middle name, Bourchete, was my great-great grandmother’s maiden name.  She was from Alsace-Lorraine.  I have few other details and am largely an Italian-Irish mutt who self-identifies first as a New Englander, but this vague heritage may influence my love of this region’s food.)

Here we have smoked pork chops and trotters, knockwurst, bratwurst, somethingelsewurst, potatoes and bacon nestled in reisling-simmered kraut.

And seriously, what could be better on a blustery November evening than a Choucroute Garni like the one we made today in class?  Make do with a glass of dry, mature reisling or a malty kronenbourg, and hail the cuisine that makes you long for sleet on a beautiful May afternoon. 

Today we prepared dishes from Brittany and Normandy.

Although a province of France, Brittany is one of the six “Celtic Nations”, and as such has its own language, Breton. Brittany is known for its buckwheat fields and resultant buckwheat pancakes (galettes) as well as its seafood.  It is a historically significant fishing area, and still boasts one of the largest ports in Europe.  To celebrate its temperate shore warmed by gulf streams, we made Cotriade, a simple fish chowder using salt port, potatoes, onions and whiting that craggy old Breton salts would make onboard their sea-faring vessels.  It is served over croûtes and sprinkled with a sauce of peppercorns crushed in red wine vinegar.  This sharp sauce really makes the difference between something only a very hungry old Breton fisherman would like, and something you would enjoy for dinner. 

We also made shrimp soufflé.  I am of the opinion that soufflé is not worth the fuss, and the idea of soufflé interferes with my notion of simple seaside pleasures like fresh belon oysters eaten with a sunburn.

On to Normandy.  I would have made a happy Norman milkmaid, or so I supposed as the aroma of calvados and cream cooking together in the classroom led to thoughts of frolicking through apple orchards and dairy pastures after a good day of cheesemaking and cavorting with the herd. 

The first time I had pork in the Norman style it was made by a young man who was lucky enough to have a French mother who imparted to him that one culinary gift.  I remember walking home from dinner feeling very impressed and a little tipsy from the dry cider we imbibed, and having a spat with my then boyfriend who insisted that what had been served wasn’t such a big deal.  After preparing the same dish today (browning 4 seasoned pork chops and 2 apples cut into thick rings, deglazing the pan with a little apple brandy and enough heavy cream to coat the pork, and throwing the whole situation in the 350 degree oven for 15 minutes) I realized how little goes into the execution of this deluxe dish.  So I am retroactively less impressed with that otherwise inept young man, and after many years have elapsed am able to say that yes, Richard, though luxurious, Côte de porc Normande are not such a big deal. 

1. We are beginning to focus on regional French cuisine as of tomorrow, and as homework I get to read a huge tome on the history and evolution of la cuisine!
2. I learned that Andouille is traditionally made from only pig intestines and stomach, and that I’ve been misled all the times I’ve eaten jambalaya, and can now quest through the city for the real deal!
3. My 11 year-old brother reads my blog!

My family (the parents, the 15 year old sister, the 11 year old brother) all came to town this holiday weekend to make a Tenement-style Fam Jamboree in my studio apartment (I stayed around the corner at Aunt Sue’s).  We had dinner Saturday night at Great Jones and dammit, I just love Great Jones.  I love their jukebox, their catfish, their bloody mary mix, their cheery service and their prices. I love that they throw a fun party every year for staff and regulars with food and beer and live music even though the place is the size of a walk-in.  And now my family loves their peanut butter pie.

P.S. - Pirates of the Carribean III is terrible, no matter what my siblings say.

A couple of weeks ago I had an unplanned meal at August with my cook crush.  We shared an onion and bacon tart with creme fraiche and each had linguine with peas, artichokes, fava beans, and guanciale.  Everything was delicious - the pasta was like carbonara’s rough and earthy peasant cousin - and the meal wasn’t too costly, certainly not when considered in the context of food quality and ambiance (which is cozy and hearth-centric, with its wood-burning oven).  It was the first meal I’d had with the crush, and a great audition for his role as companion/adviser on the Grand Tour of Externship Possibilities. 

The Grand Tour:  I want to have a meal at a restaurant before I decide to spend time there working for free.  I want to know what service is like, see presentation, how busy the dining room is, how they treat customers, taste the food.  Of the 5 or so places I’m considering, 2 or 3 are new to me, so I’m visiting them over the next couple of weeks.  The Tour is also a thinly veiled excuse to have another dinner with the crush and to spend money I really should be putting aside for things like health insurance. 

So I’d made reservations late last week for a Thursday 8:00 party of two at Annisa.

I was really jazzed about dining at Annisa because it has many of the pros I’m looking for in an externship site: a woman chef owner-operator, reliance on seasonal and local ingredients, small kitchen so I can get more hands-on, walking distance from my apartment.  Anita Lo is known for her deft touch with fish, and I’m more interested in meat and charcuterie, but I have so much to learn that this doesn’t count as a con. Once there, wait over, we agreed to throw caution to the wind and get the 5 course tasting menu with paired wines.  Our one request was that they include the rabbit rillettes as one of our courses.  In addition to the rillettes, we had kampachi with fried lily bulbs and shallot pickle, halibut, a small peice of smoked pork, and a lemon poppy bread pudding.  Of all of these dishes, only the kampachi and the bread pudding were standouts.  The rilletes were prepared two ways and the second, soupy preparation included garam masala flavors and generally just didn’t work.  The halibut was a little overcooked.  The pork was a little tough and dry. The wines were all fine, nothing swoon-worthy.  The dining room is sort of generic-fancy plain-jane.   

The only thing worse than an uninspiring meal is a meal that you’ve been looking forward to that ends up being uninspiring.  I’m not nasty and spoiled and I’m generally forgiving of restaurant mistakes in proportion to the amount they charge and what the ambiance and service indicates about their intentions.  There was care in their preparation and presentation, pleasant service and good intentions all around, but bottom line is Annisa fell flat when it came to the gusto.  I didn’t feel ripped off, but I couldn’t recommend it to a friend.  And as far as externship possibilities go, it is now at the back of the pack.

In choosing to go to cooking school and to forge a career in the food industry I made a conscious trade-off between a narrow definition of wealth -the pleasant vacations, handmade handbags and generous Christmases of the past few years - and what is to me a truer wealth - the ability to fully experience life (shout out to Henry David Thoreau).  I wasn’t experiencing a meaningful life working at the Bank.  I couldn’t hack taking part in the middle class cycle of professional boredom 50 weeks a year in exchange for 2 weeks of me time.  I wasn’t satisfied playing with food on the weekends.  I’m not evolved enough to make like Ted Kooser, writing my poetry while working in middle management.  I’m just selfish enough to believe that I should be able to write my poetry - make my food - for a living, and just self aware enough to understand that this means an impecunious existence.

My pal commented on a post below asking if I had read the NYTimes article on the heavy debt burden and crushed hopes of celebrity had by many cooking school grads, and whether it was discussed at all in school.  In fact Chef E. raised the article in class, and I was very surprised to find genuine disbelief from some parts of the class, as the one thing I never delude myself about is money.

Many of us enter cooking school with a desire to build a career with personal relevance.  Others enter cooking school because they like giving dinner parties and think it might be fun to do so professionally, or because their parents or spouse have pressured them into doing something, anything, or - horrors - or because they think they could give really good tv and/or  - cringe - they think it is a route to big money.  

The average wage in NYC for a new cook is $10 an hour.  If you work as many hours as you can, maybe you clear $22,000 a year.  If you have a student loan like mine, after taxes that leaves you about $1500 a month to live on, in a city where the average rent for a one bedroom apartment is $1600.  And you’d better not get sick because you probably don’t have health insurance.

One difference between my school and fellow students, and some of the institutions and students referenced in the article is that our school is significantly less expensive, puts a heavy emphasis on an externship held in a full service restaurant, and caters to career changers rather than kids leaving home for the first time (though we have some of them, too).  The majority of people I’m at school with have had other lives, and have other skills that they can depend on if this cooking thing doesn’t work out.

And I think those other skills may come in handy.  While school is instantly gratifying and filled with individuals with rich life experience, it is not an accurate reflection of (and only partially prepares us for) real restaurant kitchen work.  At the risk of sounding like a smug prick, I look around school and wonder how some of my fellow students will survive their externships, never mind a career in the restaurant end of the industry.  Maybe the realities of long, low-paid, physically demanding hours will destroy us, or maybe we’ll rise to the challenge, or maybe we’ll carve out roles in other areas of the food industry.  There are union opportunities in hotels and corporate dining rooms, and there’s food media, and there’s retail…Maybe each and every one of us will become FoodTV’s next celebrity chefs.  Maybe we’ll go back to our day jobs. 

Of the 12 people left in class, I can only prophecy for myself: If I say I’m going to do something, I generally do it, even if it means limping along during the 25th mile.  Being broke, tired and in pain won’t kill me.  Being bored and continuing to fail to find something real to accomplish would have. 

Today in class we did more plating and none of it was remarkable and I’m working on a longer post about food industry salaries and opportunities for older career changers, but I want to post briefly about work so I don’t lose my stride of daily posting.

You don’t need me to wax eloquent about the condition of waiting tables - waiterrant does a better job of capturing the full spectrum of the honor and horror of serving food to customers and working with a kitchen staff.  Luckily, I have few complaints about my job - the kitchen staff I work with is more talented, funny and intelligent than those that the waiter works with, and my customers are by and large a delight to serve.

That said, I give a lot of shit to the cooks, only because they give a lot of shit in turn, and I don’t know who started and it is generally all in good fun, and because I am an old crone compared to them and have forgotten more barbs than they have conceived, and because I have the advantage of being able to walk back upstairs after delivering a zinger, I usually end up feeling like I’ve gotten the upper hand.

Not so tonight. 

Tonight, the most junior of the cooks suggested that if I were a video ho, it would be for a Whitesnake video.  I realize that the hilarity of this comment doesn’t translate well and would fare worse if I gave a direct transcript of the entire exchange, but the bottom line is, he compared me to Tawny Kitaen circa 1986.  It was an insult, to be sure, but a funny one and one that left me thinking:

1. Would a young man in 2007 think Tawny from 1986 is hot?
2. Why on earth should I care?
3. Is my hair really ’80s, like I’m stuck in a time lapse bubble? (This is a recurring fear of mine.)
4. Should I go all the way and start rocking gauzy dresses?

It is easy to feel like a weirdo when my co-workers seem stunned that I watched Happy Days during first broadcast prime-time, or that I’m as old as the bus boy’s mother. Sometimes I feel as though I’ve regressed by waiting tables, and often compensate by self-depricating humor.  Yet there is something crazy liberating about being able to take and appreciate a joke about my age from someone else.  So thanks, Josh, for busting me like an equal, and expect full-throttle brutality when I see you on Friday.

Arctic char is gets thumbs up for its flavor and environmentally sustainable cred.  Farming practices for this fish are clean and relatively low-risk in terms of threat of escape into the wild to mess with its wild brethren.  It is less fatty than salmon.  It lends itself to any preparation in which salmon or steelhead trout fillets are called for, and is generally cheaper than either of these similar fish.

And its skin has pink polkadots!

You can barely make them out, but those dots are there, beneath the candied orange zest, above the orange, fennel and olive salad.  The green on the plate is fines herbs oil, and the pink a delightful citrus vinaigrette.  I totally love pink and green together, the combination looks like peonies smell. 

In addition to the char, we made a ridiculous sweetbread stuffed quail with seared fois gras, and venison with butternut squash puree and mushroom gratin.

I was doing alright plating the food until I went overboard and put a silly looking slash of black currant pan sauce over the quail.  Ever the deadpan, and not unkindly, Chef S. observed that sometimes you really don’t know how bad something is going to look until you see it.  This is why I don’t experiment with makeup.

Constructional apraxia is a condition in which an individual has a desire and a physical ability to carry out a drawing or other representational configuration, but is unable to do so.  Although I do not have this serious neurological disorder, I’m often frustrated by my artistic limitations, becuase I can imagine what something should look like but can rarely acheive it. I am not a good drawer.  My Christmas cards look like a ten year old made them.  Food preparation isn’t much different - I have very specific ideas about how my efforts should be presented, and often come up short.  Luckily, good smells and tastes cover a multitude of food presentation flaws, but we eat with the eyes first, so one of my objectives in school is to learn more about techniques and theory of plating.

Today in class we started a new module with Chef S. back at the helm, and began discussing presentation in earnest.  We prepared three complete plates:

1. Tuna carpaccio, horseradish mayonnaise, fried capers, microgreen salad
2. Seared scallops, braised cabbage, Pommes Maxime
3. Sautéed halibut, spring vegetable ragoût  

We broke into teams to prepare the elements of these dishes.  Our team fabricated the halibut and made the ragout.  Once all teams were done preparing, we cooked off our protiens individually and placed the elements of each dish on the plate as we wished. 

John Constable said that he never saw an ugly thing in his life, that light, shade and perspective will make any object beautiful.  Bear this in mind as you consider my team’s individual presentations of the tuna and scallops.  In each case, we were all charmingly unique from one another and honestly, all fairly amateur.  But that’s why we’re here.

Mine are at the right in each row.   Go ahead and click on the photos if you want a closer look.  The tuna made one hell of a lunch and my girl Anittah got the leftover scallops as her new job is right between school and the gym (I love having friends in the ‘hood!).

Carpaccio:

Scallops:

Prepared a strip steak pan sautéed with a red wine reduction sauce, pommes persillade and haricot vert as my final practical exam for this module.  Rocked it.

Toasted this success as well as OK’s birthday with the best of the class at the local dive bar, The LimerickHouse.  Nothing like a pint of Guinness at 11 a.m., dishing on the bad apple, celebrating our beloved Chef E. and comparing externship possibilities to make you feel that life is well ordered.