Shrimp Poo

We skipped any lecture to review the recipes quickly then, got straight into it. The first thing was shrimp for the Shrimp Louis. Everyone got a pound or so of jump shrimp, and I showed them the proper way of deshelling -- tail first, trying to preserve the tail meat. Then the rest of the exoskeleton can be pretty much easily removed. Then the back of the shrimp is cut with a pairing knife, about 1/4 inch deep, and the vein a.k.a. the intestine is removes. Most shrimp are starved for a day or two before processing so the intestine is empty, but occasionally you'll get a swollen blue vein full of sand, grit and purple stuff. Mmmm, shrimp poo!

I broke up the class into three at this point, after wiping down everything, washing the boards and washing hands -- you can never be too careful when dealing with raw seafood. One team of 2 made the sauce for Shrimp Louis (based on the herbed mayo we made yesterday), then made 2 large composed platters, with bib lettuce as the base, the shrimp in the middle, and garnishes like sliced hard boiled eggs and olives all around. The second team did a pasta salad, fusilli dressed in our mayo and grated Swiss, with a lot of vegetable mix-ins, also composed on platters. The third team did a simple Cesar with the dressing made yesterday, and cut up a few loaves of bread and tossed them with melted butter and salt before toasting them in a 450 degree oven for a few minutes.

While that was going on, I pulled on student aside who muffed up brownies yesterday. I pulled all the ingredients out for a batch of brownies, and had her make them on her own. I think he confidence might of been bruised yesterday because of distractions from her disorganized team, so letting her do this seemed like the move....and we can always use more good brownies in this world!

The 10 lbs of shrimp were dropped into a large pot of boiling water spiked with the juice of 4 limes, and after 2 minutes were taken out and placed in an ice bath. Not enough can be said to stress the importance of shocking when boiling shrimp. Few things nastier than rubbery overcooked shrimp.

Once the three sets of salad were out, we cleaned and set up for sandwich making. I spoke a bit about the importance of balance, erring on the side of too-little, folding the fillings so it's not too dense, putting oil-based spreads on the bottom to prevent mushiness, etc. Most of the kids never had prosciutto, which freaked them out when I told them it was aged for months and months instead of being cooked.

Sandwiches were banged out, the salads were out, the brownies presented. On a funny note, someone mistook the clumps of unsifted flour in the gluey mint brownies as nuts:


The kids seemed pretty happy, everyone pitched in with the cleaning, and the staff and parents had the kids come out of the kitchen for minute for a round of applause. Next week, sauces, featuring funked-out mac n' cheese...

Feel like ch-ch-ch-ch-chicken toniiiite!

For the second lesson of the second semester, I stuck to the recipes and format (see this post for the gory details) but ran the class a lot smoother, ending on time for the second week in a row. We started with the question: what is cooking? It is applying heat to food to change it's nature. Last week we were chopping, mixing, blending, all preparation. That's legit, and there can not be cooking without preparation, but it is not cooking. Last week we prepared. Today, we step up and cook!

But not before preparing. These kids still have no knife skills, so first thing was to whip out 20 lbs of russets and have them cube them off (rather than peel), then make small cubes. Once that was done, I took a few kids to be on potato duty, while the others did soup-chop on a selection of vegetables for stock. The potatoes were boiled, drained, spread on a sheet and baked for a minute to make them perfectly dry, run through a food mill then mixed with an obscene amount of cream, milk, butter and salt. I stopped the class, had everyone come over and had them taste it without salt. Then I seasoned and made them taste it again. I got the "AH HA!" moment I was looking for in the smoothies last week. Loose, creamy and outta sight!

The stock pot got full, covered with cold water and set to boil. After 20 minutes, I showed the class how to make a sachet d'espices (parsley, thyme, bay leaf, cracked peppercorn in a tied-off cheese clothe) and added it to the stock. Last time, I attempted to make vegetable soup in the same session but there wasn't enough time. This time, the stock went into the freezer right after.

Ten heads of Swiss chard were deveined, cleaned and chopped up. I took four students, assigned them one fat (chicken fat, butter, sesame oil and peanut oil) and had them slow saute onion half-moons to soft, then slightly brown. The chard got boiled for a minutes, drained, thrown in ice water for blanching and shocking. Once the onions looked right, we through in the chard, chopped up kalamata olives and adjusted with salt.

It was only 5pm! I made a promise if the kids were to hustle and clean up and we had time, I would show them how to bread and fry chicken breasts properly. I really expected to not do this, but these kids did not have to be ridden to clean up. Once they had finished their tasks, they started cleaning every time. So I busted out 8 breasts, sliced each one in half at a 33 degree angle to kinda keep the thicknesses even. I set up the SBP -- standard breading procedure. First bowl, AP flour. Second, egg wash with whole egg and milk. Third, the breading, in this case wholewheat panko breadcrumbs, AP flour and salt. In a preheated rondeau, dumped about 1/4 of an inch of peanut oil. Once the chicken got dipped in each bowl, using alternate hands to prevent the creation of a batter mitt, the chicken went straight into the oil. Flipped after about 5 minutes, when the first came out I asked them how do you know it's done? Ya take a small knife, make a slit on the underside and you peek into the middle! It looked fully white, but still juicy. One student insisted in looked slightly pink, but it was JUST right. It was probably pink 30 seconds before, but in this state it was still very juicy.

So the meal was pretty complete -- crunchy panko chicken breast, Swiss chard with onion, and whipped potatoes. As we did last week with the time, we went around the table after the main feed was done and said what we liked most and what we liked least about class. Most said the best part was eating. Some kids says there was no bad, which is nice, a few said tasting the kalamata olives were the worst, or the cutting of onions, or wot-not. Compliments all around about the chicken, which was nice. Makes me think I should make something like that, simple but interesting, at home more often.

Next week is salads, both mixed and composed, as well as some additional things, as we'll be cooking for Thursday's PTA conferences, too!

No, that's not ice cream....

Above is a picture of cold shmaltz, a.k.a. rendered chicken fat. A byproduct of making chicken stock, it floats to the top and, when refrigerated, solidifies, and is easy to remove. It's then reheated again over the stove; all non-fats evaporate and all non-fat solids burn and float to the bottom. Pour off the hot fat, refrigerate, and it's good for a year or so (if kept in the back of the fridge). And what better way to make some icky bitter greens magically delicious than adding a wallop of chicken fat...?

Today's class was about vegetable cookery, but really, how many vegetables can you really get into on 3 hours? First thing, we sat and I briefly lectured. What is cooking? Applying energy via heat to food to change its composition. There are only two classes of cooking: dry heat (baking, roasting, broiling, frying in all its forms) and moist heat (boiling, steaming, simmering). There is a bastard third, combination heat (braising, stewing, where something is browned in dry heat then moisture is added to finish).

Then we went quickly from abstract to solid, reviewing the recipes of the day...

“MASHED” POTATOES

Yield: 10 servings

Russet Potatoes 4 lbs
Butter, room temperature 6-8 oz
Milk, hot 12 fl.oz.
Heavy cream, hot 12 fl.oz.
Salt to taste
Ground black pepper to taste

1. Scrub, peel and cut potatoes into large pieces.
2. Boil or steam until tender.
3. Drain and dry over low heat or on a sheet pan in a 300˚ oven until no steam rises from them.
4. While hot, puree potatoes through a food mill or potato ricer into a heated bowl.
5. Add butter and mix into potatoes by hand or with the paddle or whip attachment of an electric mixer until just incorporated. Add milk, cream, salt, pepper by hand until smooth and light
6. Spoon potatoes onto heated plates or transfer to a piping bag and pipe into desired shapes.

The class started with knife skills. To save time, we didn't peel the potatoes; we just turned dirty round potatoes and rectangular skinless beauties into large dice. I already had a large pot of boiling water on, we dumped the potatoes in and I assigned a student to watch the potatoes, taste a cube for tenderness ,and call me when ready. I had the other students start the knife work for the next recipe -- while others drained the potatoes and pushed them through the food mill into a bowl heated from the ledge on top of the oven. I showed them the correct way to fold (with a rubber spatula, from 12 o'clock to 6 o'clock around the edge, then flip to the middle. Turn the bowl clockwise 90 degrees, repeat). Then came the butter and half-and-half...and finally the consistency was right. I had everyone taste; then I salted th dish and everyone tasted again and...what they tasted blew their minds. As I had promised, these were the best mashed potatoes they'd ever had!

VEGETABLE STOCK

Yield: 1 gallon

Vegetable oil 2 fl.oz, or as needed
Mire Poix*, large dice 3 lb
Nonstarchy vegetables* 3 lb
Salt 2 tsp
Cold water 1 gal
Sachet d’Espices* 1

1. Heat oil in large rondeau or stock pot and add mirepoix, vegetables and salt.
2. Cover and sweat the vegetables 10 to 12 minutes, stirring occasionally.
3. Add water and salt. Simmer 15 minutes.
4. Add sachet, simmer 10 minutes.
5. Strain the stock. Degrease by skimming if necessary. Use immediately or cool rapidly and store for later use.

*Mire Poix: 2 parts onion, one part carrot, one part celery
Non-starchy vegetables like leeks, tomatoes, garlic, etc.
Sachet d’ Espices: Enclose the following in cheeseclothe, bound by kitchen twine
3 to 4 parsley stems,
1 sprig of thyme or 1 tsp dried thyme,
1 bay leaf,
1 tsp cracked peppercorns

In the lecture I told them about mire poix, the mix of vegetables that are sauteed first before adding other things to add a certain flavor. It's French, but every culture has a version, like Spanish Sofrito (onion, green pepper, garlic) and New Orlean's Holy Trinity (Onion, bell pepper, celery) and the idea of stock -- a flavorful liquid that can be cooked with that brings an intensity of flavor rather than a dilution of flavor. A lot of soup-chops, and another student assigned to turning the veg in the stock pot until soft. We made a sachet, covered in cold water, then we were off on the next recipe. (Next week, we're going to make vegetable soup with the stock...)

We made tomato concasse. How-to: Score the bottom of the tomato, drop in boiling water for about 30 seconds. Shock in ice water to prevent any serious cooking. Peel off skin, which now comes off easily. Cut into quarters and cut out all the jelly and seeds, so just bare solid tomato flesh is left. This can be used in stock and soup, without generating scum, papery skins or bits of seeds floating everywhere.

SWISS CHARD WITH CARAMELIZED ONIONS

Yield: 6 servings

Olive oil/Sesame oil/butter/ shmaltz 2 tbsp
Onions, thinly sliced 2 medium onions
Salt A pinch or two
Swiss chard, stems removed, 1” x 4” chiffonade 1 bunch
Kalamata olives, pitted, rough chop ½ cup
Salt to taste
Black pepper to taste

1. Bring a pot of well salted water to a boil
2. Heat large skillet over medium heat, add oil
3. Add onions, stir to coat with oil and salt
4. Continue to cook onions, making sure not to burn or brown. If they turn brown within 5 minutes, reduce heat. Cook 20-25 minutes until caramelized (a golden brown color). If they get to dry, add more fat.
5. When water is at a rolling boil, add Swiss chard. Cook to tender, 2-4 minutes
6. Shock chard in a bowl of ice water, drain and remove all excess water.
7. Stir chard into the onions, cook until excess moisture has evaporated and chard is heated through, 2-3 minutes
8. Toss with olives and salt to taste. Serve immediately.

Everyone sliced onions, then two students de-veined and made chiffonade of the chard. Chiffonade is rolling the leaf into a cigar-like shape and cutting it thin -- it results in more even, elegant cuts and prevents bruising of more delicate leaves. Four others got on the oven and I introduced them to the saute pan. Heat the pan first then add the oil. As I discussed in the lecture, one of the least healthy things you can do is eat scorched and burnt oil. Not only does it taste bad, it has all sort of cancer-causing substances. Heat the pan first, then add the oil. Test with a piece of onion, then go for it, constantly moving with tongs, paying attention to color, adjusting the heat if it's browning too fast or not fast enough.

For interest, I had each one use a different fat -- olive oil, butter, sesame oil, and chicken fat that I brought in from home. The butter took noticeably longer, due to the water content in this fat -- the others were all lipid, but butter is actually a mishmash of fat, proteins, sugars and water. I had them taste, looking for the sweet flavor. Unfortunately we didn't have time to go the full caramel, but they were good.

The chard was blanched and shocked, dropped into boiling water for 3 minutes, then drained and dropped in an ice bath. I explained blanching -- and how, in this case, doing so cooks the leaf and removes tge bitter elements. The shock of the ice stops the cooking abruptly, and locks in the bright green color. Squeezed out, it was tossed in the pan with the onions with some chopped olives, then seasoned.

After cleaning, we sat down to eat and it was a lot of fun eating each of the chards with the potatoes. Everyone was gaga over the potatoes and took some home, but no one liked the chards enough to take any home. To my taste, it tasted more like caramelized onions and olives which had greens in it as an afterthought, but STILL they didn't dig it. They did agree that chicken fat tasted the best, but not enough to finish the plate. You can bring a horse to water....and you can make a healthy vegetable extremely unhealthy, but a teen still won't dig it!

Next week, salads, which will be matched with sauteing of tender cuts of meat. And that damn vegetable soup. Soup n' salad!

Weights and Measures/Blanching and Shocking (Dicey Dices)

The day opened with a quiz on sanitation and herb ID. Ten herbs were spread out around the room with numbers for identifying, and the multiple choice questions were no big deal. Upon review of the answers, I somehow mistook Cilantro for Chervil. Ninety-five percent ain't bad.

An ounce is an ounce is an ounce, unless you're measuring volume (the amount of space a material takes up), then it's a fluid ounce. Today's lecture defined the English Standard series of measures for weight (lbs and ozs) and volume (tsp to G), and the simple math need to convert recipes to larger or smaller amounts. Lip service was given to the metric system -- if a chef were to give you a recipe in metrics, all measures in the kitchen would be metric so there would be no need to waste time and lessen accuracy with conversion.

Chef M discussed blanching, defined as boiling in salted water until just-cooked. This reduces strong flavors or smells, sets color, makes skins easier to remove, and prepares vegetables for other cooking methods that may not otherwise cook thoroughly on their own. We proceeded to dice a large amount of potatoes; prepped haricot vertes and broccoli; blanch the vegetables and shock them in ice baths (to stop the cooking); and boil the potatoes before running them through a food mill. The vegetables were thrown into a hot pan with a little bit of water and butter, then coated (or, as the method is known, glazed). Copious amounts of cream, butter, and salt went in to the potatoes. According to Chef M, you keep adding salt until it tastes 'good' -- not necessarily salty, but right before that point.

At the end of class, potatoes were distributed for us to take home and practice on. My diced potatoes were relatively cubical, and the chef complimented me on a nice dice. One other student's dice was weirdly flat and chip-like -- how does someone mess this up? I'm going to practice on my taters tonight and try to dice them with some speed; in a real-life situation, I'm not going to have all the time in the world to achieve a nice dice so my boss can pat me on the back.

ADDENDA:
Speaking of weights & measures, I tipped the scales at 229 this morning, a pound up from last week. A few people who read this blog congratulated me on my 7lb weight loss, but I shrugged it off -- I didn't really try too hard and know it'll fluctuate with water, the weather, etc.

As I was engraving all my tools with a symbol to indicate my ownership (as every student's tools are identical), I dropped the bread knife by accident. It bounced off my leg and I barely gave it a notice. As I picked up the next blade to engrave, I noticed a not-small trickle of red down my thigh. Damn, these things are sharp!

BREAKFAST: 6:30am, organic cheerios with good milk, .5 bowl, hunger 3/5

AM SNACK: 9am, fresh french bread, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

AM TASTING: 11:15am, broccoli and haricot vertes with mashed potatoes, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 2pm, homemade cheese ravioli with homemade tomato sauce, quart of seltzer, 2.5 bowls, hunger 4/5

PM SNACK: 5:15pm, Ben & Jerry's "Half Baked" icecream, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
Went to the local conventional supermarket to pick up cleaning supplies and paper for note taking. Felt sugar cravings and the need to treat myself. Took a long look at the freezer section, B&Js is not organic but has about half the number of ingredients of some other brands. This weed-themed treat is half chocolate, half vanilla, half chocolate chip cookie dough and half brownie. A bit of a mess, and all the chunks of stuff left a chalky taste in my mouth against the indistinct ice cream flavors. But I imagine it would be amaaaaazing if I was stoned, maaaaan.

DINNER: 7:15pm, baby carrots & cucumber with ranch dressing, 3 ears of fresh corn with sea salt and the good butter, 1.5 bowls, hunger 4/5

WEEKEND REPORT:
Ate lots of healthy vegan and vegetarian food from a nice buffet at Omega with B & the HVS. Being that it was all-you-can-eat, I wasn't really watching how MUCH I ate -- good nutrition yes, low-calorie no.

On Saturday I went out on my bicycle and did a large loop around Rhinebeck and Red Hook. I passed Migoreli (sp?) Farms, which I buy a lot of produce from at the Union Square farmer's market. After a few hours I was hungry and my map said I wasn't near any towns. So I went with what was available: a gas station. I bought a bag of lightly salted 'kettle' potato chips and a 2-pack of Entemann's chocolate-coated donuts. I ate a lot of them as a kid, my parents would get them for dessert. When I grabbed these two things, I briefly looked at the nutritional info -- 400 calories, not too bad. When I sat down and started reading, I noticed both of these bags were TWO servings - 800 calories and about 50% of my daily sodium. On top of that, the donuts tasted kinda of....plastic, a coating of wax all over my mouth. It had more than 2x the salt as the chips, but you wouldn't know it by taste. Fractionated palm oil is not a delicacy.