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Hey guys!
For those of you that didn't see my one other blog post (so far) I am currently pursuing the dreams of becoming a chef.
I had a lot of misconceptions about the food at the Culinary Institute of America at hyde park (CIA) before coming here, actually.
First off I thought it would be a much wider, near-worldwide spread of cuisines and techniques, and instead it mainly focuses on french and american foods and skills. Little disappointing since i'm a huge fan of japanese and asian style foods and cuisines. Oh well.
Secondly, I figured when coming here that the food would be fantastic. Well, that was dumb. the food is plentiful (except weekends when there are no classes and they have essentially no food available on campus and a bunch of students too broke to go out and buy ingredients to store and use) but as for quality, it's very hit or miss. I mean, many students are cooking things for the first time here, like people who have never worked with lamb or duck or who have used different methods of cooking vegetables and soups, so it's a new process and it's simply not one that they're perfect at. The results? The food being at a lower quality than you would hope, and occasionally some things even coming out undercooked to meet the growing demands of yelling chefs and hungry students under bizarre time constraints. I don't blame them, I mean, if you came to college to never screw up, there wouldn't be much of a point for school then would there?
That being said, occasionally, some kitchens just hit it right out of the ball park. There is a banquet cookery class at school that generally is the most advanced out of the production kitchens, only before people go to restaurant row (the 3 actual restaurants on campus where they work both as servers and as cooks), and that has had to date my best meal here.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/TEUU2.jpg)
Not a super complex dish, and it's been so long I don't remember what the white sauce was unfortunately, but the red one was a reduction of the juices.
When I had this meal coming to me, I figured it was going to be amazing. As they say, you eat with your eyes first, and for cooks/chefs that's even more important, because we know what to look for. If your sauce is an odd color, we'll normally be able to tell if you caramelized instead of sweat the onions/leeks/whatever for it. if your meats too rare we can tell sometimes just by the sear on the outside. When this showed up in front of me, my first thought was hmm, may be a little too rare, but i'll be darned if they didn't hit all the other details just right. when you're worry is not about getting food out but in how precise plating is, it means they had the time to not worry about quality back in the kitchen but looks, and taste comes before all else.
meat was a bit rare for my tastes, but it was delicious, and the two sauces were both a perfect consistency and flavor. the mouth feel was a spot on almost buttery sort of smooth, with a nice, not too heavy flavor to them. the vegetables were cooked perfectly, and while it's sort of par for the course to see now, i'd never seen piped mashed potatoes like that before. it was a cool experience and some really good eating! (Sorry, I wish I could get a better description of this but i had to take pictures with my iphone and ran into trouble loading it onto my computer. x.x Just trust me, while none of it was as good as my last blog on fine dining restaurants, this was still a really, really excellent meal, and it was the first (and only) meal that i would rate as deserved to be on and in an upscale restaurant.
Secondly, there is apparently a thing called grand buffet that happens once every month or two at my school where all the baking and pastry chefs come out and create a huge display and buffet of everything, breads, chocolates, candies, mousses, and other desserts.
There was simply too much to go over, so i'll simply leave it at this: some of it was amazing, some of it less so, but it all looked incredible.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/NQIcX.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/5lrYD.jpg)
Sorry for the quality of the last one here, I swear it looked better on my iphone and I don't have a real camera. : /
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/1C5PP.jpg)
And now for the centerpieces of the whole thing, a (slightly) closer version of the dr. seuss themed art. To be perfectly honest i'm not sure if they are made out of chocolate or fondant or something else as my baking skills and knowledge leave much left to be desired, and they had a chocolate display that looked eerily similar in style but smelled of chocolate, and that's how i knew. Here I didn't smell the chocolate but there were lots of other scents that may have been crowding over it. Regardless, it's pretty freaking awesome.
Enjoy!
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/z1Xyz.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/wI9Y0.jpg)
I'll be trying to find the best meals to post about since, well, if i posted the worst ones at school I'd feel like a huge dick, and i'd probably be posting my own food once i clear fundamentals and fish and meat classes and start work in production kitchens.
in the meantime, I was downstairs in the store room and i found a very funny sauce.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/EYysC.jpg)
get it? Har har, so funny hot sauce. Yeah yeah i'm not funny, shut up, i'm a cook not a comedian. Which also explains why Dane Cook isn't funny, but i don't think i'd want him in my kitchen either.
leave questions, comments, suggestions, whatever down below! I'll try to get back to you and actually say some more interesting things in the future, but there's been a somewhat lack of interesting things. Also, the practicing baking and pastry students taste to me much more skilled than the culinary students, but at the same time, one is more about the recipe and the other is more about the actual techniques and skills used during preparation so that may account for some of why the desserts at school taste like they are just waaaaaaay higher quality than the dinners/lunches themselves. oh well. I'll get better at both someday anyways.
See ya guys!
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United States10627 Posts
should be titled FOOD PORN ONMONONOMONOM!!!
i want. *drools*
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Dude, awesome. Love the food porn (Forn?) and close analysis of little details that serve as tells for the knowledgeable connoisseur.
Also, the Har Har Hot Bean sauce is actually a sauce made from fermented soybeans mixed with chili paste and salt.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doubanjiang
Korean derivation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gochujang
I used to have a Sichuanese friend whose mom would seriously use a meat stir-fry based around this sauce in every single meal she served.
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Very cool shady! The chef i'm trying to take extra lessons from is actually a graduate from the Sichuan culinary institute in china and an amazing asian chef, winner of huge numbers of awards and certificates and such and just generally an awesome chef. Her name is Shirley Cheng.
As for those little details, I wish I could share more but it was so long ago for these that I just forget... that being said, the jamaican fruit cake from grand buffet I remember trying and... not being a fan of. at all. that's really all that stuck with me. x.x
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On August 26 2012 11:20 Silverfoxx wrote:
Very cool shady! The chef i'm trying to take extra lessons from is actually a graduate from the Sichuan culinary institute in china and an amazing asian chef, winner of huge numbers of awards and certificates and such and just generally an awesome chef. Her name is Shirley Cheng.
As for those little details, I wish I could share more but it was so long ago for these that I just forget... that being said, the jamaican fruit cake from grand buffet I remember trying and... not being a fan of. at all. that's really all that stuck with me. x.x
Oh wow, nice. Just read her bio and she looks like a true pro.
Is it usually the case that the same chef who preps the main course also preps the dessert?
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On August 26 2012 21:06 Shady Sands wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2012 11:20 Silverfoxx wrote:
Very cool shady! The chef i'm trying to take extra lessons from is actually a graduate from the Sichuan culinary institute in china and an amazing asian chef, winner of huge numbers of awards and certificates and such and just generally an awesome chef. Her name is Shirley Cheng.
As for those little details, I wish I could share more but it was so long ago for these that I just forget... that being said, the jamaican fruit cake from grand buffet I remember trying and... not being a fan of. at all. that's really all that stuck with me. x.x Oh wow, nice. Just read her bio and she looks like a true pro. Is it usually the case that the same chef who preps the main course also preps the dessert?
It depends on the restaurant, a lot of smaller ones don't go out and hire their own pastry chef because it's expensive and on the culinary side people can send out homemade desserts themselves, or, as sad as it is, a lot of customers don't realize/care that their desserts are pre-frozen and come packaged from a plant in alabama.
In some fancier restaurants, they will hire a pastry chef who's entire job is just to come in, have their own little corner of the kitchen, and pre-prep breads and desserts that the culinary guys/servers just have to either reheat or take out of a cooling area to serve. When it gets to REALLY fancy restaurants that have a more complex dessert menu, you may have several pastry chefs alone to keep them rotating fresher throughout the night and to get everything done properly.
A good test to see if you're getting overly-priced box desserts is, if you see a few classic tell-tale signs like a brownie with ice cream, cheesecake, a pie, tiramisu, ask your server if the desserts there are homemade. Usually they'll tell you. I went to a fairly nice restaurant and was completely surprised once, because i asked one that had carrot cake, tiramisu, brownie cheesecake and what looked like a specialty dessert what was homemade, and they told me only the tiramisu and the carrot cake were, and those are two of the more common ones to get from outside.
That being said, if it's got a dessert menu that looks like even somewhat unique desserts and not stuff that every restaurant has, then it probably isn't from a package. They generally tend to stop using packaged desserts when entree prices start going up from 15$ pastas to 25-30$ steaks and such.
that being said, if you go to a small restaurant you've heard has great desserts, try them anyways. Packaged desserts work because they're not bad you know, just not great.
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On August 27 2012 01:51 Silverfoxx wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2012 21:06 Shady Sands wrote:On August 26 2012 11:20 Silverfoxx wrote:
Very cool shady! The chef i'm trying to take extra lessons from is actually a graduate from the Sichuan culinary institute in china and an amazing asian chef, winner of huge numbers of awards and certificates and such and just generally an awesome chef. Her name is Shirley Cheng.
As for those little details, I wish I could share more but it was so long ago for these that I just forget... that being said, the jamaican fruit cake from grand buffet I remember trying and... not being a fan of. at all. that's really all that stuck with me. x.x Oh wow, nice. Just read her bio and she looks like a true pro. Is it usually the case that the same chef who preps the main course also preps the dessert? It depends on the restaurant, a lot of smaller ones don't go out and hire their own pastry chef because it's expensive and on the culinary side people can send out homemade desserts themselves, or, as sad as it is, a lot of customers don't realize/care that their desserts are pre-frozen and come packaged from a plant in alabama. In some fancier restaurants, they will hire a pastry chef who's entire job is just to come in, have their own little corner of the kitchen, and pre-prep breads and desserts that the culinary guys/servers just have to either reheat or take out of a cooling area to serve. When it gets to REALLY fancy restaurants that have a more complex dessert menu, you may have several pastry chefs alone to keep them rotating fresher throughout the night and to get everything done properly. A good test to see if you're getting overly-priced box desserts is, if you see a few classic tell-tale signs like a brownie with ice cream, cheesecake, a pie, tiramisu, ask your server if the desserts there are homemade. Usually they'll tell you. I went to a fairly nice restaurant and was completely surprised once, because i asked one that had carrot cake, tiramisu, brownie cheesecake and what looked like a specialty dessert what was homemade, and they told me only the tiramisu and the carrot cake were, and those are two of the more common ones to get from outside. That being said, if it's got a dessert menu that looks like even somewhat unique desserts and not stuff that every restaurant has, then it probably isn't from a package. They generally tend to stop using packaged desserts when entree prices start going up from 15$ pastas to 25-30$ steaks and such. that being said, if you go to a small restaurant you've heard has great desserts, try them anyways. Packaged desserts work because they're not bad you know, just not great.
Hmm, got it. My girlfriend has a sweet tooth (she always steals my dessert, lol), so I thought I'd ask. Thanks!
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If you don't mind, I'll ask a few slightly personal questions (feel free to ignore any number of them):
How old are you? Did you study a different major or work in different fields before joining CIA?
Why did you decide to become a chef?
What was the enrollment process like? I hear CIA is extremely competitive, is this true?
Is it difficult to graduate? Which positions do graduates typically work in (I'm imagining something like a line cook?)
Class demographics (age, ethnicity, gender, etc)?
I'm seriously thinking about studying to be a chef at some point later in life, so im just really curious 
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On August 27 2012 02:04 Cambium wrote:If you don't mind, I'll ask a few slightly personal questions (feel free to ignore any number of them): How old are you? Did you study a different major or work in different fields before joining CIA? Why did you decide to become a chef? What was the enrollment process like? I hear CIA is extremely competitive, is this true? Is it difficult to graduate? Which positions do graduates typically work in (I'm imagining something like a line cook?) Class demographics (age, ethnicity, gender, etc)? I'm seriously thinking about studying to be a chef at some point later in life, so im just really curious
I'm 22 Years old, and before coming here, I was going to a different university (stony brook university) for 3.5 years, didn't complete my degree, a lot of wasted money because it's just not what i wanted to do. it was what my parents wanted me to, but not what I wanted to.
I decided to become a chef because food's always been a big interest in mine. Other people would pay money to go out to concerts, buy instruments and a bunch of other things. outside of the occasional game, all of my money went towards going out for a fancy meal. It's something i've always enjoyed and had a passion for, and up until recently never really thought about making a career out of it.
The enrollment process is a bit awkward, since it requires a letter of recommendation from your employer that you've worked for at least 6 months with a good work ethic and everything else. Outside of that, CIA is just an ordinary college. As for it being extremely competitive, well, it's competitive for a culinary school. That being said, there's a little bit of a selection process to get in here (a few good grades are needed, recommendations etc. etc.) but, culinary schools in general are known to accept anyone with a pulse and a wallet, so if you can pay the bill to come here, chances are, you'll be able to get in. That being said, I have no idea how competitive it is for international students. I had no problem getting in but i'm not sure about some of the other students here. I'd guess a general rule of thumb is if you're competitive for other colleges, you shouldn't have too much of a trouble getting in here.
Is it difficult to graduate? Depends on the person. Do your work and you'll be fine, put in some extra hours outside of class for stuff you're not doing great on and you'll DEFINITELY be fine. Lots of people here, like everywhere, are fairly lazy and don't do homework etc. because it's mostly written and their train of thought is I came here to cook, not write. that affects grades, bad grades = no graduation, etc. etc. The only other threat to graduation is if you get depressed and/or upset easily. Chefs are temperamental and the teachers here reflect that, they'll yell and shout and whatever and the one i'm currently working for has a bad habit of throwing things around the kitchen that are in the wrong spot (Upended a tray of ingredients people were working on unpacking because they were slow and didn't have it done in time. eggs everywhere.) The chefs are also extremely critical of the things you do (according to most people. I'm much more critical on myself than my chef is on me actually.) so if you can't deal with stuff like that, some people get really upset and depressed and their work and grades suffer because of it.
Graduates work wherever the hell they want to, haha. A handful go to work as line cooks in big name restaurant, a few open their own restaurants, some go towards executive chefs of hotels or work their way up the line of huge chains (one of our graduates is the Executive chef and preparer of the Denny's menu.) Other people come here just to be better at home cooking (very very few) and others go into food writing, or try to get onto TV for food shows. If your goal is to become a linecook though, I do recommend trying to get a job at a local restaurant and learning skills through the restaurant instead. Honestly, what I plan on doing once I leave here is trying to go to japan and get a job to really increase my knowledge of the cuisine and my skillset over there, maybe even open my own restaurant over there someday, so even though im spending a huge chunk of money here (though I certainly hope that scholarships start becoming more readily available soon) my personal plan for a job will be a very low-paying one.
Demographics, I know at hyde park, it's about 55% males, 45% females schoolwide. For my class, there were 78 culinary students and 18 baking and pastry students, and all 18 of the baking and pastry were female. (little odd, it's definitely female dominated for baking, but usually there are at least a few guys in it. as for age, it's about 50% just out of high school students and 50% older students, a little more for my particular session because it was the first available after high school graduation (70-30 or so). lots of younger 18-year olds and such, but also some people who are much older. my class has a guy who is mid to late 40's and is nowhere near the oldest full-time student that CIA has taken. The place is filled with predominantly white american's and has asian as it's second largest demographic (I can't be more precise than that, i'm sorry.) my class of ~100 has I believe 4 or 5 international students, 2 I know from korea and one from Taiwan.
If you want to become a chef, I DEFINITELY recommend getting at least a year or two in a couple different restaurants, not even necessarily cooking, just to see if you like the life. it's high stress, high hours, and low pay (Except for bakers who tend to have medium stress high hours and low pay.) A lot of people love cooking, but don't realize that they love cooking for themselves and friends, and not cooking for complete strangers. it takes a special breed of person to be a chef, just like a professional gamer. A different mindset and view on life.
If you have any more questions, i'll be happy to answer them to the best of my ability. Sorry I can't be more exact though, demographics on my class aren't exactly what i've been studying here. 
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What is your favorite dish to make? Least favorite? Why?
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About how much practice do you get on making any specific recipe? I know I'm only now happy with cookies that I've made dozens of times, but I also love to try new recipes. How broad is your most commonly prepared repertoire, and how often do you find yourself consciously adding to it?
Thanks for your time!
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Favorite dish to make? Beef wellington is awesomely fun. It's kinda cool to just see how the individual parts work, and that you can prepare a thick beef dish with a sauce (usually mustard but can be a duxelle or a red wine or anything) inside of a crust, and if you layer your prosciutto or your thin ham properly you'll still have a firm and not soggy crust to it. It's really an amazing dish and the recipe allows for soooo much variation to do to it, and when you make one and everything comes together you really feel like you've done something well. that being said it takes forever to properly make fairly small servings of it at a time, even further if you do a small piece of filet fully wrapped in puff pastry rather than a full, unportioned filet that you then cut into small pieces to serve.
My least favorite? I hate emulsion sauces, like mayonnaise. I can never get my portions right and everything so when i do them in a hurry homemade and so they seem to break at all the wrong times. : / Oh, and wine reductions, because I ALWAYS try to add silly spices and make them taste more like a reduced mulled wine (german recipe) instead of a real, proper reduction.
As for midnight's question, there is no such thing as perfection, and right now i'd say the only thing in my repertoire that is consistently at a high quality level would be steak and beef. And for some reason, my mashed potatoes, which I always thought were good, have been deemed at this school as lack luster at best. :c unfortunate. But to really get recipes that you enjoy in cooking all you have to do is know how to properly prepare the food and know ratio's. the rest is flavoring and taste, adding different things for texture or to brighten it up and make it pop more or to leave it heavier and make it richer.
About how much practice do I get on making specific recipes here, well, i'm too early in the program to tell, but if you remember to ask me that in about 3-4 months, I'll get back to you. currently im in the fundamentals class which focuses on knife cuts mainly and preparing 1-2 dishes properly each day. so far the only dishes i've submitted for approval i've been told are okay to good, but I've tasted and felt terrible about, so I guess i'm doing okay in terms of the class overall. Or i'm going to get my grades and feel really bad. I'm also fairly confident about my knife cuts so that's something I guess, haha.
Now, when it comes to baking it's something different entirely. I can barely remember the recipes, and can only remember the consistency, and the way you get baking recipes and refine them is continue making them with slight changes until the finished product has the consistency you want, since when cooking you can change spices, add salt, wait to add other things later, and continuously taste your work to see how it's coming along. Baking you basically just have to put it in and hope that your changes fixed what was wrong with it and got what you did.
I feel like i've done a terrible job so, practice making specific recipes there is no end to how much you keep practicing it. Look at Jiro Ono of Subayashi Jiro in japan. He's been making sushi for over 65 years in japan, has done everything he can think of to make his food better and still claims that there is more work that needs to be done, so there is no perfect recipe, no recipe that can't be perfected or changed even further. One of my favorite quotes is from him, and that is "To make delicious food, you must eat delicious food." If the palate of your customers is more refined than your own, what tastes good to you may just be average to them. So to make good food you must consistently be unhappy with your own food and critique it and change it, even if by little things such as doing 1/3 a teaspoon of something instead of 1/4, to make it so that to you, it tastes better than the first time you tasted it.
And really, my most commonly prepared repertoire doesn't exist. I love trying new recipes too much, and I change everything. I haven't put real thought and practice into preparing recipes and dishes that i'd like to call my own and critique into oblivion yet.
I know, I sort of rambled, hopefully I answered your questions though. The second one was a little more difficult to answer which is why I kinda did it twice, haha. X3
The second best thing I prepared outside of a fabulous beef wellington is a pumpkin spice cheesecake with a bourbon brown sugar cream. I got it off of cooks illustrated, and after trying it 3-4 times, there is still so little in that recipe I would change. It does require a subscription to them to see it, but trust me when I say it is a PHENOMENAL recipe and is absolutely delicious. First best would be the beef wellington because, well, it's beef wellington man. It's just yum.
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Cool, thanks for the quick and detailed response. I've never actually tried to make a steak before, as most cuts are above my price point, and I'm almost a bit daunted by the sheer quantity of meat :3. Any advice on where to start in that regard?
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sweet blog. chefs have a ridiculously intense life. a couple of my friends do it. work insane hours, not a ton of pay, but they all love it. i imagine that all the chef teachers are like gordon ramsey
why do you like Japanese/asian cooking? And what has been your biggest kitchen mess up thus far
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Just sayin', the Chinese words 哈哈 is literally "haha." Its supposed to be a laugh.
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Midnight: Steaks it's more a feel things through as you go kinda thing. I'd suggest watching a few videos on youtube to see how they go, and if you can, do it on a grill over fire. Steaks are fatty enough as is so you don't really need to do them in a frying pan with additional oil. I recommend throwing a little bit of lemon with it to cut the fattiness slightly and really brighten it up, but other than that, I actually prefer most of my steaks chopped up and cooked more of a stir fry style, even if done without vegetables or anything and just using a little bit of steak and seasoning. To really tell you anything though, i'd have to kind of be there in person. I'd try and make a video detailing it but I just don't have the equipment, ingredients or time to do so. :c I hope if you do try it works well for you. The best thing you can do to ensure proper cooking is sear the outside really quickly, then put it covered to relatively low temperatures to cook it all the way through. Other than that, America really likes the flavor of the beef alone (little weird) whereas traditionally, chinese need some kind of sauce like a peppercorn or a mustard sauce to put on it, because the beef alone just won't have any kind of flavor they like. Hope that helps a little. ^^;
Hawk: I know, haha, I'm looking forward to it though. I have maybe 12 hours a week right now that are actually me hours and not used studying something, taking classes, eating or sleeping. the rest is practicing, doing homework, or trying to learn japanese. I personally just love asian flavors, japanese in particular. It's hard to explain but they sort of pop out differently when eating them. China has some of the best sauces i've ever had (sorry france) and the japanese level of seasoning on things just feels so perfect. outside of that, I love the culture of those countries, for example, in japan it's customary to slurp your soup as loud as you want/can to let the people making it know they've done a good job. Part of it is most likely because I haven't had the chance to experience it as much as american, french, or italian foods, and once i eat more japanese food I'll grow more accustomed to it and it will stop being so damn amazing every time i try it, haha. one of my favorite things to have ever eaten was a simple lotus root braised in soy sauce and a touch of sesame oil with some toasted sesame seeds on top.
my biggest kitchen mess ups... here, the worst thing I've done has been over-peppered my onion soup quite severely because I threw in the sachet d'epices (or, literally "packet of spices") which had pepper in it, then threw the amount of pepper that a quart of soup would need directly into the soup completely forgetting it was already in the sachet. horribly overpeppered and i just got really lucky that the applejack (whisky, i think) he threw on at the very end almost completely cut out the over-pepperedness of the soup. it was still a litle peppery but it wasn't ridiculous.
My worst kitchen mistake at home would be when i tried to make a little bit of a spiced red wine reduction to go with the beef wellington (only made once, haha) for my grandmothers birthday. that was dumb because A) the mushroom duxelle sauce in the recipe made it completely unnecessary for a sauce, and B) I did a horrible horrible mixture of spices and it just came out like a spiced dessert red wine sauce and it was just bad. Keep in touch though, I'm sure i'll have worse accidents in the future.
If you were looking for worst injury, I got 3 stitches in the base of my thumb where I stabbed myself with an oyster shucker trying to open an oyster someone else messed up. and no, we didn't have proper gloves. I could actually see through my thumb over to the other side of it. freaked me the hell out. XD That being said, we're supposed to have one bad accident every 5 years or so, some less some more, so I should hopefully be set for a while.
Jombo; Haha, that's awesome. I wonder if it's supposed to be a pun on the sound people make when they eat something too hot. XD
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One bad accident every 5 years? =S
Also thanks for telling us about the beef wellington--what are any tips or tricks to making it?
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On August 28 2012 03:18 Shady Sands wrote:
One bad accident every 5 years? =S
Also thanks for telling us about the beef wellington--what are any tips or tricks to making it?
Well, when you're working quickly with sharp objects in close proximity to your fingers 1 per 5 years isn't really that bad a thought.
For the beef wellington, find a good recipe online (gordon ramsay does some of the best) and pay careful attention to cook it and reroast it probably. aside from that, the best trick would be to really lay out the prosciutto without and cracks in it for the sauce to leak through, otherwise as you heat it and roast your dish the sauces will leak through and cause a soggy bottom in your finished product, and soggy puff pastry while delicious because of the sauce it absorbs has a horrible texture and is much better when eaten in conjuction with both the sauce and the meat while still crisp. Beef wellington is unlike steaks where it's less feel and more about the recipe since you will be baking/roasting it, usually twice.)
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On August 28 2012 12:25 Silverfoxx wrote:Show nested quote +On August 28 2012 03:18 Shady Sands wrote:
One bad accident every 5 years? =S
Also thanks for telling us about the beef wellington--what are any tips or tricks to making it? Well, when you're working quickly with sharp objects in close proximity to your fingers 1 per 5 years isn't really that bad a thought. For the beef wellington, find a good recipe online (gordon ramsay does some of the best) and pay careful attention to cook it and reroast it probably. aside from that, the best trick would be to really lay out the prosciutto without and cracks in it for the sauce to leak through, otherwise as you heat it and roast your dish the sauces will leak through and cause a soggy bottom in your finished product, and soggy puff pastry while delicious because of the sauce it absorbs has a horrible texture and is much better when eaten in conjuction with both the sauce and the meat while still crisp. Beef wellington is unlike steaks where it's less feel and more about the recipe since you will be baking/roasting it, usually twice.)
Got it. Thanks so much, did not know about the role of the prosciutto in that way.
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EPT
