Lemons....

Ok so I have been a little slack this week with both my blogs.  Well, Wednesday I took my first test and I think it went GREAT I still don't have my score yet, I should get it Tuesday.  I did breeze through and I knew the answers.  There were only 2 questions that I had to stop on and really think about.  I am hoping I got the right answer for those.  But if I did miss those 2 then I will still have an A because they grade on a 10 point scale!!  But that will affect me getting a gold star so we will see.  After our test we just had an open practice day.  Practice cutting anything we have learned thus far.

On Thursday we learned a lot of new cuts: julienne of carrot, zucchini, celery, leeks, and peppers.  Julienne basically means to cut into very fine strips. Not to be confused with Allumettes which also means very thin French fries.  But you only do Allumettes on potatoes and Julienne on vegetables.  Cool huh? 

Then we learned Paysanne of carrot which is thin triangular shaped (I love cutting these), Scallion Sifflet which is a long narrow cut at an angle, and tomato Concasse which is the process of Emondee and des.  Emondee is the process of skin and seed removal and Des is outer flesh cut into strips then diced.  So Cocasse is no seeds/skin, cut into strips and diced.  Perfect for making salsa!  These are pretty cool cuts and I need to do a lot of practice with them still.  Tomorrow afternoon I am going to a friends house to practice cutting and then we are going to make a stew with all these veggies.  YUM!! 

Then on Friday, we had a lecture on large and small kitchen equipment, equipment ID, and we got to play with fresh herbs.  He laid them all out a table and little labels next to them and encouraged us to taste, touch, smell them to help learn how to identify them.  This part was a lot of fun.  I took pictures so I could at least get to see them to study in live form and not just a book picture.  We are going to be tested on them soon I think so I want to get them down.  I felt like I knew a lot of herbs but then realized kind quickly that I know them as in jars and not fresh, most of them look very different in fresh form.  Then for our lab we got to play with lemons.  We did a "dent de Loup" which is a lemon crown and then just for fun Chef showed us how to make a basket out of a lemon to get awe factor and if we get an awe then we can charge more for that item haha sneaky. 

(My lemon basket is a little uneven and it got smashed in my bag)

The pictures through out this post are from the past few days walking home (which is was rainy and cold) and sites I see when walking around town and of course my Lemons. 

On Friday I also had an interview after school.  So I took extra clothes with me and tried do something nice with my hair but it was in cap all day so this was the best I could get it before I went to my interview. I think it went really well.  This interview was definitely the best interview I have ever been through.  She basically told me I more than likely had the job but I have to go back in on Monday and meet another manger.  I will hopefully be working at DoubleTree Hotel this week.  Keeping my fingers crossed!!