Still here, I promise!

I know, I've been a bad blogger. You've all emailed me for updates, wondering when I'd post more here. I know!

Things have been busy around here. Intermediate Cuisine is coming to an end, and I haven't posted a single photo! I've been to Prague and Lisbon and Bruges, and haven't had a second to write about any of those trips; and more trips are coming up! You need to hear about the Thanksgiving I'm cooking at the corner bistro, and the rugby party at that same bistro I cooked for! And I've had some amazing visits from home, with more in a few weeks. Life's a whirlwind here in Paris. But it's fun!

But yes, I'm here; I'm happy; and I'll write more soon. Now I've got to go make bouillabaisse...

The rest of Basic Cuisine - A Photo Montage (Part IV)

Alright, y'all. Time for the down and dirty catch-up blog post. I know, it's been over a month. And certain of you keep nagging me to update my public on life in Paris..... but hey, I've been busy! Living life, cooking food, traveling, and hosting visitors. And you expect me to write??

So yes, here comes the update. (And yes, I was technically supposed to come home a month ago. That's true. But I wasn't done. There was more cooking to learn, more living in Paris to do. So I'm here to finish the diploma, and I get back to the States in late December. Really. I promise.)

The last ten days of basic cuisine ... in a nutshell:

Soupe de moules legerement safranee (lightly saffroned mussel soup), cotes de veau grand-mere (Grandma's veal chops ... not my grandma, but perhaps some French grandma!), and fins sables aux pistaches, fraises a l'italienne (strawberries Italian-style with pistachio biscuits -- one of my favorite desserts of the term). This day I learned that I like veal chops when they're not overcooked (and when they're served with mushrooms, onions, and bacon), and the combination of pistachio, strawberry, basil, whipped cream, and mascarpone is amazing.


Huitres chaudes au muscadet (warm oysters with Muscadet), canette rotie aux navets (roast duckling with turnips), souffle chaud au Cointreau (warm orange and Cointreau souffle). Learned that while I love magret de canard, and Peking duck, plain old roast duck doesn't do it for me. And when Andre Cointreau is the owner of your cooking school, you make Cointreau souffles, rather than Grand Marni(er) souffles. Oh well.



Queues de langoustines grillees aux epices, sauce vierge (grillled langoustines with spices, olive oil sauce), gratin de saumon au cresson (salmon and watercress gratin), saute de boeuf Stroganoff, rix aux legumes (beef Stroganoff, rice with vegetables). As I had learned from Mark earlier in the year, langoustines have a tendency to be mealy, and in order to wind up with a couple of good ones, you have to cook lots of extras. I just don't think they're worth it. Give me a grilled jumbo shrimp over a grilled langoustine any day. (Who's from Louisiana? Geaux Tigers!) But this beef Stroganoff recipe? It's going to become a staple, I loved it! And since I've gotten decent at brunoising vegetables, might as well...


Flan de truite, sauce porto (trout flan with port sauce), medaillons des porc charcutiere, pommes Dauphine (pork medallions in charcutiere sauce, potatoes Dauphine), sabayon aux fruits frais gratines (fresh fruit gratin with sabayon). Apparently, it's not a sauce charcutiere without cornichons, as much as I tried to convince Chef it would be better that way...


Gnocchis au fromage a la Parisienne (Parisian gnocchi. I kid you not. I never knew such a thing existed. And don't tell anyone, but I prefer the Italian kind...), poulet saute a l'estragon, bouquetiere de legumes (sauteed chicken with tarragon, and turned vegetable garnish), pommes meringuees, jus de framboise (apples with meringue, raspberry sauce). So Parisian gnocchi are a mixture of pate a choux (the dough used for eclairs, but unsweetened) and potato, cooked and then placed in a gratin dish with cheese to brown. I'm just not into it. Boiled pastry dough? Blech.


I am, however, getting somewhat better at turning vegetables. Still think it's a silly skill, but turns out practice really does help.

Oeufs brouilles au saumon fume (scrambled eggs with smoked salmon), terrine de poisson chaude, beurre blanc (hot fish terrine with beurre blanc), creme bavaroise a la vanille, sauce cafe (vanilla bavarian cream with coffee sauce). I can't wait to visit my parents, and try out my new scrambled eggs techniques with Dad. His scrambled eggs are the best, but maybe I can give him a tip or two from the French chefs! And, fish terrine is shockingly better than expected.


Filets de daurade poeles au fenouil (sea bream fillets with fennel), pintadeaux de loue au chou (guinea fowl with cabbage), rezules au poires (fried pear-filled puffs). This may have been my favorite fish dish to prepare in basic, despite the fact that I don't love fennel (sorry John). I've become decent at fileting daurade, julienning fennel isn't the worst thing in the world, and the dish plates nicely. I found myself hoping I'd get this dish on the final exam (notice the foreshadowing?) Also, pear desserts are fantastic. I've known this since the days of the pear tart at Cahors in Tokyo, and it is still true.



Salade de chevre chaud a la ventreche (warm goat cheese salad with bacon), jambonnette de volaille et son jus au madere, pommes poelees caramelisees (stuffed chicken legs, madeira jus with caramelized apples), mousse au chocolat a l'orange (chocolate and orange mousse). Yum. That's pretty much all there is to say about this day. Oh, except for this -- in order to stuff a chicken leg, you remove the thigh bone, and chop off part of the leg bone, and then push it down so it remains as a handle, but does not extend too far into the meat of the chicken leg, so there's room to put the stuffing. So I did all of this, stuffed the chicken legs, and set off to cook them up. Of course, one of my chicken legs was more artfully stuffed and manchonner-ed than the other, so I had my eye on that one to serve to Chef. But when I picked up the leg to turn in the pan, I had the brilliant idea of picking it up by the bone (to avoid piercing the skin or meat!) -- and pulled the bone clear out of the leg. Apparently I was a little overzealous in my manchonner-ing. But this really was the most beautiful piece, still, so when it came time to plate, I covertly jammed the leg bone back in, and crossed my fingers that Chef wouldn't lift the leg by its bone when he was tasting. (All worked out well.)


Croustade d'escargots aux champignons des bois (snails with wild mushrooms, in a pastry case), pave de sandre, sauce aux herbes, ratatouille (pikeperch steak, herb sauce, ratatouille), magret de canard a l'orange (duck breast in orange sauce). All I'll say is this, thanks to Chef Cotte, I think I've learned the secret to an orange gastrique, and magret a l'orange is definitely on the short list for my first dinner party when I get back to DC.



Carre d'agneau roti persille, legumes printaniers et tomates farcies (rack of lamb with parsley crust, spring vegetables, and stuffed tomatoes), gratin dauphinois (potato gratin), omelette norvegienne (baked Alaska). This is also on the short list for the aforementioned dinner party. Wow. This was our last class in basic, so Chef made enough for us to each have a full meal, and we popped a few bottles of champagne. It was not a bad day.



All that was left was the written exam, and the practical exam (yes, I was nervous; and yes, I got the fennel fish; and yes, it went well). And graduation!


Next post? What we've done so far in intermediate! And travels outside of Paris! And visitors!

The rest of Basic Cuisine - A Photo Montage (Part III)

Writing these blog entries has been a good refresher on all of the recipes we've learned, which was good, since our final exam was coming up! It was yesterday, and it was actually a lot of fun ... but I'll get to that in due time...

After learning the methods for making various kinds of soups, we turned to more traditional French recipes, and, in general, our demos shifted from three dishes demonstrating similar techniques, to full meals (entree, plat, dessert). This demonstrated the timing and multi-tasking necessary for preparing an entire meal in a given time period. (We're not there yet, though ... in practical we generally just prepared the plat, and occasionally the entree!)

So, lesson eighteen: beignets de gambas, sauce tartare (deep-fried jumbo shrimp, tartare sauce) and souffle au fromage (cheese souffle). You'll all be happy to know that my souffle rose beautifully (although Chef Poupard did help me out a little with getting my egg whites to consistency. I have small arm muscles!) I couldn't help think about the souffle scene in Sabrina ("A woman happy in love, she burns the souffle; a woman unhappy in love, she forgets to turn on the oven.") and wonder what this says about my lovelife ... but I digress ...

In demo, chef also made saute de veau Marengo, pommes a l'anglaise (veal Marengo with boiled potatoes), and clafoutis aux fruits de saison (seasonal fruit clafouti). We learned that veal Marengo is so named because it is the dish Napoleon had the night before the Battle of Marengo (only he had it with chicken, because veal wasn't available - I kid you not!) But did he have it with those heart-shaped croutons??


The next day, we made blanquette de veau a l'ancienne, riz pilaf (traditional veal stew, rice pilaf). Not one of my favorites. Not difficult to prepare, but I'm not much of a stew person...

As a starter, chef prepared saumon cru marine a l'aneth (salmon marinated with dill) -- a nice light accompaniment to the heavy stew -- and for dessert, tarte au sucre (sugar tart). So I didn't go hungry!


But, I was happy to move on to our next class, when we made tournedos grilles sauce bearnaise, pommes Pont Neuf (grilled tournedos with sauce Bearnaise, potatoes Pont-Neuf). Potatoes Pont Neuf are so named because, according to legend, they were fried right there on the bridge. Chef suggested we plate them in a bridge formation, to continue the theme.


A few weeks later, I was able to demonstrate my sauce know-how at dinner at Hotel Costes ... after tasting Matthew's bearnaise (and amusing him by wanting to taste the sauce unadulterated by the steak it accompanied!), I subjected him to a discussion of how I'd improve it (it was missing acidity and flavor ... so a better vinegar/wine/shallot reduction). I think he realized at that moment just how much of a food geek I am!



That same day, Chef also demonstrated how to make flamiche (leek tart), and parfait glace au cafe, sauce caramel et cognac (frozen coffee parfait with a caramel and cognac sauce). Our degustations keep getting better and better!

The rest of Basic Cuisine - A Photo Montage (Part II)

Onward and upward. Les poissons, les poissons, how I love les poissons! Fileting a fish is not so easy, although I've definitely gotten better at it over the weeks. My first filets (on day TWO!) were small ... but this is definitely a skill where practice makes, well, maybe not perfect. But better.

We learned how to poach fish in a court-bouillon, making troncons de colin poche, sauce hollandaise (poached hake steaks with hollandaise sauce). (But don't be fooled by how easy that sounds ... we turned THREE different vegetables that day!) We also learned how to braise fish, making filets de barbue duglere (brill filets in white wine sauce). Brill is a flat fish, and is a beast to filet -- there are two filets on each side, and finding precisely where to cut is challenging. Also a challenge for some of my classmates? The sauce! This was the first time we didn't pass our sauce through a chinois before serving (because the sauce is supposed to have the perfectly cut tomatoes, onions, and shallots that have been cooking in it), but a few of my classmates strained their sauces out of habit ... all that hard work in the trash!



Chef also made sole meuniere (pan-fried sole with nut-brown butter), goujonnettes de sole, sauce verte (breaded strips of sole, green sauce), and escalope de saumon a l'oseille (salmon escalope with sorrel). After a couple of weeks of meats, we were all happy to be eating a little lighter! (And yes, I realize that fried fish really can't be called light ... but in comparison to some of the other dishes we've been cooking and preparing, it's downright healthy eating!)



Next up? Soups. Day one was creme dubarry (cream of cauliflower soup), potage cressoniere (watercress soup), bisque d'etrilles (crab bisque). My least favorite of the three was the bisque (Anne and I decided it's because we're used to wonderful Maryland crabs, and this is one thing that the U.S. does better than France!), and unfortunately, that was the one we made in practical. This marked my first experience in cleavering live crabs, and it was actually pretty fun. Except, of course, the fact that when your knife lands in the middle of the still living crab, its claws reflexively move up to cling to the sides of the knife. A little disconcerting. (Sadly, when I excitedly related my crab-cleavering stories to a friend from home, he responded that he has crab-cleavering duties every summer when his family makes crab sauce. There goes my unique and entertaining story!)



The next day, we learned how to make soupe de poisson facon marseillaise (fish soup Marseillaise-style) and soupe a l'oignon gratinee (French onion soup). Fish soup just isn't my thing, but the onion soup was fantastic. (Are those three bowls all for me? Don't I wish!)


Next we learned how to clarify a consomme. I had no idea how fun and rewarding this would be! Maybe it's my science-y brain, but learning how and why egg whites work to clarify bouillon, and then actually making it happen was one of the most satisfying moments I've had here so far. (And it didn't hurt that my brunoise of carrots, daikon, haricots verts, and celery to garnish the finished product was lovely! Hooray for sharp knives and sharpening knife skills!)

More to come ...