FINALS and Where is the beef?

The past two nights have been almost controlled chaos in the kitchens. Tuesday Night was the final cooking lab for Garde Manger. I blew it big time. And I know I blew it big time. My kids got into my head before class, and I lost my focus and creativity, my knife at one point.

Edible Man

Finished boat

I blame myself for getting to wrapped up in the kids and not focusing on the important job of getting through the mystery protein and come up with a winning dish. My edible arrangement of a swan apple came out pretty nice, I was thrilled with it. My idea of a grape man in a melon boat with apple flying kites fell a little short, but at least it was kinda cute and done. As for the mystery protein I had Hot Italian Sausage. Why didn't I make Empanada's with a cool sauce. Keep it simple! No I had to go and make ANOTHER curry dish and just blowing the couscous again, to where I had to sweeten it up and just pretend it was fine.

Apple Ricotta Tart

Hot Italian Sausage Curry

Final Dishes

UUGGHH. Very frustrating! It was cool though, to work through the challenges at hand. Finding the ingredients I wanted and needed was challenging this week to say the least but then having an extra pressure on top of the final was just a whole new level of stress. Why is it that we had no garlic for a week even more than a week, we now  have a bag of garlic and no oil or heavy cream. Once we were all started in cooking it was interesting how one by one we were shouting out on if someone had an extra onion or spice to share. I showed Nicky how to clean shrimp, since she had never touched shrimp before. I shared the little bit of heavy cream I commandeered, and all my spices to the other students. I borrowed an egg from someone for my ricotta apple tart. In the end we are all there to help and learn from each though even with the stiff competition for the knives. I really wanted Annette to win the knife this time. But she had her own challenges going on. Like no baking powder for her cobbler which was great in flavor. I do love my cookbook Chef Emi gave me. You can one never have enough cookbooks and two I will cherish the thoughtful words she wrote in it. I shall miss Chef Emi as my teacher and proud I was part of her very last Garde Manger class. Next time if there is a next time, I am going to focus and just go with my gut feelings and leave the kids home.

Flounder Demo

Pretty

Wednesday night in International Cuisine was another story in itself. For the past eight weeks it's been Sheila and I. Chef Ellerbe asked if we wanted to join another team since this is our final and we have... count them! 5 protein dishes to make! Shrimp, crabmeat, pork chops, flounder, chicken with a Caribbean influence. So like where is the beef?  Why not add that into the challenge. "Don't forget you have to use a Poblano pepper and some of the vegetables and other ingredients leftover in the refrigerator from our other classes. Extra credit if you use other ingredients from the previous chapter." So Chef says.  After a quick conference Sheila and I just knuckled down and went to work alone as a team:
1. Grilled Shrimp, pineapple and seaweed kabobs with a lime marinade (extra credit for the seaweed)
2. Flounder marinated in citrus and ginger, grilled over rice

3. Pork chop in a jerk dry rub and then seared and baked off with a curry vegetable sauce served over mashed plantain and sweet potato with a curry mashed califlower. (extra credit for Indian influence)
4. Curried  seared and baked 1/2 chicken served over rice with a grilled tomato.
5. Stuffed Poblano pepper with crabmeat and panko bread crumbs, a whole lot of spice.
6. EXTRA CREDIT Cuban Bread pudding. Made with cubed Cuban bread, rum, eggs, cream, cinnamon, sugar, pineapple, shredded coconut and coconut milk custard.
Well the pictures speak for themselves

Final Caribbean Dishes

Sheila and I met the challenge, we fell short on some dishes  and excelled in others. But in the end I am very proud of us. We did it together and worked together and survived the heat. As for the heat from Chef Ellerbe; well I will get that in the kitchen at SAVOR since he too is moving on from teaching at TCC. He will be missed by all, past, present and future students.