saturday
after our late night at the pub, we all enjoyed a lie in and lazy saturday morning. by 10.30am, the six of us were eating elisa's french toast casserole and watching an episode of 'entourage'. we had decided to head into cork for the day and by 12.30pm the six of us plus two other classmates were divided up into two cars and heading into the city. charlotte, emily, rose and phoenix stopped in cobh on the way into cork while elisa, connie, minnie and i headed straight in. we visited the english market, enjoying the sausage sandwiches at o'flynn's and the delicious sides at the mediterranean stall. elisa and i could not sample enough of the glorious green dip made of ewe's milk cheese, basil, garlic and olive oil. and the sample of parmesan cheese and figs was divine.
we wandered a bit down patrick street before heading to the 'liberty grill' for lunch. i had suggested it but didn't want to talk it up too much and have the girls be disappointed. fortunately, everyone loved what they ordered as well as the restaurant itself. completely satisfied, we paid the bill and headed to marks & spencers to do a quick grocery shop before meeting up with charlotte, rose, emily and phoenix at the hot chocolate shop. we ran into phoenix on our way to the hot chocolate shop and found out that the girls were shopping. we opted to head back to school as the thought of naps sounded wonderful.
one of our classmates was celebrating her birthday saturday evening and had organized an outing into cork to go dancing. minnie, charlotte and emily were looking forward to a night out while elisa, connie and i decided to spend the evening at the cinema instead. we saw 'no strings attached' which was entertaining but not something i would see again or recommend. our evening ended around midnight and the dancing crew got in just before 4am.
sunday
i woke sunday morning to sunshine streaming into our room. after a quick breakfast, i was dressed and off for a long walk. i walked part of the loop, heading down a few side roads just to see some of the spring lambs. the view was so incredible that i had to stop several times just to soak it up and commit it to my memory. i made my way back to the school a little over an hour later and found my cottagemates up and discussing the previous evening. i laughed as they filled me in on all the drama and funny events from their night out.
elisa got back from church shortly after two and the six of us plus rose and nicole piled into two cars and headed to lismore for afternoon lunch at o'brien's chop house. while the drive made me carsick, the views were just incredible. we arrived in lismore around half three, parked and walked two blocks to the restaurant. justin greeted us as we entered the chop house and showed us to our table. we had a lovely lunch that included a starter and main and for some, dessert. some of the girls were looking forward to the traditional roast beef but because it had sold completely out, they enjoyed steaks instead. connie and i had the pollock and garlic mash which was quite nice.
we left lismore and got back to ballymaloe shortly before 7pm. i did a load of laundry and my order of work for monday while watching 'remember me'.
14 March 2011
carmina burana
i didn't sleep well thursday evening and i think it had something to do with the two (wonderful) cups of coffee i had on our field trip. after tossing and turning, i finally fell asleep around 4am only to wake to my alarm at 6.45am. but it was friday and that alone was enough to motivate me to get up and out of bed.
stephen was already in the kitchen when i arrived at 8.30am. he was making a loaf of granary bread, which he wanted to get out of the way before starting in on the items he was to make for the morning. i was making pears poached in saffron syrup, a mild madras curry with fresh spices and sue's health bars. the pears needed to be served completely chilled, so i made them first so they could hang out in the fridge while i made the curry. the curry was tedious as i had to cut the lamb from the shoulder and then trim off the fat. once i finished that, i sliced up the onions and cooked them with some crushed garlic. i browned the lamb in ginger and then added it to the onions, added nut milk, fresh spices, tumeric and sugar and whacked the dish into the oven for the required hour cooking time.
the biscuits i was making had been made by my cooking partner the week before and they intrigued me. i was a bit skeptical that 'health' was part of the name, but after looking through the recipe i noted that these bars didn't contain nearly as much butter as some of the biscuit recipes. as i collected my ingredients, sue (one of the instructors) came up to me and told me that that recipe was going be published in a magazine and that someone from the school would be photographing the bars later in the day. 'make them lovely', she advised. no pressure, right? i labored longer than usual on the preparation and then put them in the oven. when they were done 35 minutes later, i quickly cut them and left them to cool. the outcome was delicious and sue even sent a plate of them home for me and my cottage.
my curry came out of the oven just before noon and after bringing up the seasoning a bit, i was happy with it. i plated it up with some basmati rice and a few wedges of lime. i pulled my pears out of the fridge, arranged two very neatly in a bowl and then spooned some of the saffron syrup over them. my instructor tasted and gave me positive reviews. i took my pears out into the dining room and dumped my curry into the communal bowl of curry, tidied my work section and headed off to lunch.
afternoon demo started with a visit from a past student who had interned at the american academy in rome. she spent ten minutes sharing her experience with us and i think all 62 of us were furiously scribbling details so we could look into the internship later. it sounded like an amazing opportunity. darina thanked the girl for coming and then rory began demo. he started by making a variety of meringues (almond with chocolate and rum cream, chocolate with chocolate and rum cream and chocolate wafers, toffee gateau with caramel shards and irish coffee) and them moved on to bruschetta with mushrooms and slivers of parmesan, goat cheese and rocket bruschetta with tomato and chilli jam, crostinis with parma ham, goat cheese and confiture d'oignons, tomato and chilli jam, roast stuffed duck with brambly apple sauce, roast duck with traditional potato stuffing, roast duck with sage and onion stuffing, duck with orange, red cabbage and mashed parsnips. my duty for the day was to serve after demo, so i manned the bruschetta and divided up all the crostini plates.
elisa and i went for a walk when we were dismissed from demo, just a quick 30 minute stroll to get some fresh air. one of our classmates had organized a pub quiz at the goal post pub down the road for the evening, so when we got back to our cottage after our walk we showered and had naps. we headed to the pub shortly before eight and quickly found a table near a booth of our classmates. elisa, charlotte, emily and i were on a team together and while we didn't win, we did know more answers than we thought and had an absolute blast.
the 'mothatruckers': charlotte, emily, brij and elisa
minnie and connie, members of 'quiz in my pants'
matt, mary, shruti and liz, team 'sore losers' and the pub quiz winners
stephen was already in the kitchen when i arrived at 8.30am. he was making a loaf of granary bread, which he wanted to get out of the way before starting in on the items he was to make for the morning. i was making pears poached in saffron syrup, a mild madras curry with fresh spices and sue's health bars. the pears needed to be served completely chilled, so i made them first so they could hang out in the fridge while i made the curry. the curry was tedious as i had to cut the lamb from the shoulder and then trim off the fat. once i finished that, i sliced up the onions and cooked them with some crushed garlic. i browned the lamb in ginger and then added it to the onions, added nut milk, fresh spices, tumeric and sugar and whacked the dish into the oven for the required hour cooking time.
the biscuits i was making had been made by my cooking partner the week before and they intrigued me. i was a bit skeptical that 'health' was part of the name, but after looking through the recipe i noted that these bars didn't contain nearly as much butter as some of the biscuit recipes. as i collected my ingredients, sue (one of the instructors) came up to me and told me that that recipe was going be published in a magazine and that someone from the school would be photographing the bars later in the day. 'make them lovely', she advised. no pressure, right? i labored longer than usual on the preparation and then put them in the oven. when they were done 35 minutes later, i quickly cut them and left them to cool. the outcome was delicious and sue even sent a plate of them home for me and my cottage.
my curry came out of the oven just before noon and after bringing up the seasoning a bit, i was happy with it. i plated it up with some basmati rice and a few wedges of lime. i pulled my pears out of the fridge, arranged two very neatly in a bowl and then spooned some of the saffron syrup over them. my instructor tasted and gave me positive reviews. i took my pears out into the dining room and dumped my curry into the communal bowl of curry, tidied my work section and headed off to lunch.
afternoon demo started with a visit from a past student who had interned at the american academy in rome. she spent ten minutes sharing her experience with us and i think all 62 of us were furiously scribbling details so we could look into the internship later. it sounded like an amazing opportunity. darina thanked the girl for coming and then rory began demo. he started by making a variety of meringues (almond with chocolate and rum cream, chocolate with chocolate and rum cream and chocolate wafers, toffee gateau with caramel shards and irish coffee) and them moved on to bruschetta with mushrooms and slivers of parmesan, goat cheese and rocket bruschetta with tomato and chilli jam, crostinis with parma ham, goat cheese and confiture d'oignons, tomato and chilli jam, roast stuffed duck with brambly apple sauce, roast duck with traditional potato stuffing, roast duck with sage and onion stuffing, duck with orange, red cabbage and mashed parsnips. my duty for the day was to serve after demo, so i manned the bruschetta and divided up all the crostini plates.
elisa and i went for a walk when we were dismissed from demo, just a quick 30 minute stroll to get some fresh air. one of our classmates had organized a pub quiz at the goal post pub down the road for the evening, so when we got back to our cottage after our walk we showered and had naps. we headed to the pub shortly before eight and quickly found a table near a booth of our classmates. elisa, charlotte, emily and i were on a team together and while we didn't win, we did know more answers than we thought and had an absolute blast.
the 'mothatruckers': charlotte, emily, brij and elisa
minnie and connie, members of 'quiz in my pants'
matt, mary, shruti and liz, team 'sore losers' and the pub quiz winners
10 March 2011
irish artisans
today we went on a school field trip. the 62 (minus a few) of us met in the school car park at 7.45am, boarded a coach bus and set off to meet some of the amazing artisans who are making a difference for the food industry here in ireland.
our first stop was the belvelly smoke house near cobh. here, frank hederman smokes organic salmon, mackerel, mussels and eel as well as porridge and butter. he explained the process of cold smoking and hot smoking and the difference between the two.
at 9.15 we got back on the bus and drove to mahon point to experience the mahon point farmers' market. darina's son-in-law is the driving force behind this successful famers' market which is only open on thursdays. here, local artisans and specialist food producers sell a variety of food - free-range meat and poultry, local fish, organic fruit, vegetables and herbs, cured meats, farmhouse cheeses, herbs, jams, relishes, pickles, breads, cakes and biscuits. we had an hour to explore the stalls and try some of the different fare. i had a hazelnut americano from o'conaill's hot chocolate stall and a bowl of chicken curry from green saffron (which is a spice company run by a past ballymaloe student). the mediterranean stall (below) had the most beautiful olives, sundried tomatoes and mozzarella cheeses and the guy working there was happy to give me and hazel a hard time.
we left mahon point at 11am and headed to cashel blue cheese in co. tipperary. award winning farmhouse cheese makers jane and louis grubb created cashel blue cheese in 1984. their unique product is (impressively) made entirely by hand from whole un-homogenised cows' milk.
we had a proper cheese tasting of three different cheeses (a 7 week old, a 9 week old and a 10 week old) and a tour of the cheese making facilities.
we left cashel blue at 2.30pm and took the scenic route to lismore. the views of the irish countryside were just incredible. at one point, our bus driver stopped so we could see the three counties - cork, limerick and tipperary - that meet up with each other.
in lismore, we broke up into two groups. the group i was in went to the summer house first. it's an adorable tea shop owned and run by a past ballymaloe student, owen madden, who gave us a tour of the kitchen and shared his business experience with us.
we thanked owen and walked a few doors down to o'brien's chop house. o'brien's is owned by justin and jenny green and was opened in 2009, which was quite risky considering the recession going on. his advice to those of us wanting to open our own restaurant was to make sure we had good ambiance, good food and a good location.
justin talked about his two favorite events at o'brien's, st. patrick's day and christmas eve. on both holidays, they have a set dinner menu and then after eating, a piano is moved outside onto the patio and a singalong session takes place. events, he told us, that are well loved by the locals and tourists alike. o'brien's also holds a beer and curry fest on the last friday of every month.
from o'brien's, we walked down the street to mcgrath's, the lismore butcher shop. michael mcgrath, who owns the shop, and his son gave us a tour of the shop and the slaughter room. not a business i would want to get into, but extremely interesting to learn about (in my opinion).
we got back on the bus a final time, leaving lismore around 5.45pm and returning to ballymaloe an hour later. while i had listened to my ipod earlier in the day, i gave my attention to my seatmate, matt, and spent the ride home listening to stories of his travels to south america. he had me laughing, asking questions and feeling pangs of jealousy. i think i know where i need to visit next...
our first stop was the belvelly smoke house near cobh. here, frank hederman smokes organic salmon, mackerel, mussels and eel as well as porridge and butter. he explained the process of cold smoking and hot smoking and the difference between the two.
at 9.15 we got back on the bus and drove to mahon point to experience the mahon point farmers' market. darina's son-in-law is the driving force behind this successful famers' market which is only open on thursdays. here, local artisans and specialist food producers sell a variety of food - free-range meat and poultry, local fish, organic fruit, vegetables and herbs, cured meats, farmhouse cheeses, herbs, jams, relishes, pickles, breads, cakes and biscuits. we had an hour to explore the stalls and try some of the different fare. i had a hazelnut americano from o'conaill's hot chocolate stall and a bowl of chicken curry from green saffron (which is a spice company run by a past ballymaloe student). the mediterranean stall (below) had the most beautiful olives, sundried tomatoes and mozzarella cheeses and the guy working there was happy to give me and hazel a hard time.
we left mahon point at 11am and headed to cashel blue cheese in co. tipperary. award winning farmhouse cheese makers jane and louis grubb created cashel blue cheese in 1984. their unique product is (impressively) made entirely by hand from whole un-homogenised cows' milk.
we had a proper cheese tasting of three different cheeses (a 7 week old, a 9 week old and a 10 week old) and a tour of the cheese making facilities.
we left cashel blue at 2.30pm and took the scenic route to lismore. the views of the irish countryside were just incredible. at one point, our bus driver stopped so we could see the three counties - cork, limerick and tipperary - that meet up with each other.
in lismore, we broke up into two groups. the group i was in went to the summer house first. it's an adorable tea shop owned and run by a past ballymaloe student, owen madden, who gave us a tour of the kitchen and shared his business experience with us.
we thanked owen and walked a few doors down to o'brien's chop house. o'brien's is owned by justin and jenny green and was opened in 2009, which was quite risky considering the recession going on. his advice to those of us wanting to open our own restaurant was to make sure we had good ambiance, good food and a good location.
justin talked about his two favorite events at o'brien's, st. patrick's day and christmas eve. on both holidays, they have a set dinner menu and then after eating, a piano is moved outside onto the patio and a singalong session takes place. events, he told us, that are well loved by the locals and tourists alike. o'brien's also holds a beer and curry fest on the last friday of every month.
from o'brien's, we walked down the street to mcgrath's, the lismore butcher shop. michael mcgrath, who owns the shop, and his son gave us a tour of the shop and the slaughter room. not a business i would want to get into, but extremely interesting to learn about (in my opinion).
we got back on the bus a final time, leaving lismore around 5.45pm and returning to ballymaloe an hour later. while i had listened to my ipod earlier in the day, i gave my attention to my seatmate, matt, and spent the ride home listening to stories of his travels to south america. he had me laughing, asking questions and feeling pangs of jealousy. i think i know where i need to visit next...
09 March 2011
eating with your hands
the night nurse i took before bed last night allowed me to enjoy a deep sleep, but i woke up this morning sniffling and coughing, so i figure i still have another day or two before i'm feeling 'well' again. i hope.
in the morning lecture today, darina and rory covered canapes, finger food and tasty bites. they made marinated feta, sundried tomato and olive skewers, anchovy and sesame seed straws, tiny smoked salmon spirals, thai curry bites, tiny shepard's pies, teeny yorkshire puds with rare roast beef and horseradish sauce, mini cottage pies with garlic butter, spicy indian meatballs with pomegranate and coriander raita, sweet pea guacamole on warm tortillas, lamb on rosemary skewers, pork satay, a spicy peanut satay sauce, a variety of quail eggs dishes, scrambled eggs with smoked eel on melba toast, tiny fish kebabs, cheat's tarts with goat cheese, ragged filo tartlets, a canape of fish and chips and grilled sourdough bread with garlic, olive oil and sea salt. it was all plated up beautifully and looked amazing. due to my lack of senses at the moment, i passed on tasting. instead, charlotte and i ran to cloyne over lunch to get more night nurse for our cottage.
afternoon lecture was all about sushi. a former ballymaloe student, shermin mustafa, taught us how to make the sushi rice and how to roll sushi as well as how to create scattered sushi and thin japanese omelets. she also made four turkish recipes as her dad is turkish. i so wished i could have tasted them because they looked amazing! one was called 'lamajun' which is a sort of lamb pizza. first it's cooked in a heavy skillet for a few minutes and then put in the oven under the grill for another 3-5 minutes. the dough is made from yogurt and flour and i bet would be good made on its own and used for dipping, nibbling, etc. the other dishes she made were a dolma, merjemec chorba and turkish bulghur.
once we had been dismissed for the day, charlotte, rose and i went for a stroll around the school gardens. the daffodils are up and they are gorgeous! such a happy flower, really. it was nice to enjoy the fresh air and the beautiful evening. when we got back to our cottage, i tackled the huge pile of recipes i had been meaning to file since last friday. it only took the better part of an hour. rumor has it that when we finish up the 12 week course, we get a bound book with all our recipes. if that's true, i feel like this filing has been a waste of time!
elisa is making dinner tonight - chicken, broccoli and rice casserole. ah, lovely comfort food. :)
in the morning lecture today, darina and rory covered canapes, finger food and tasty bites. they made marinated feta, sundried tomato and olive skewers, anchovy and sesame seed straws, tiny smoked salmon spirals, thai curry bites, tiny shepard's pies, teeny yorkshire puds with rare roast beef and horseradish sauce, mini cottage pies with garlic butter, spicy indian meatballs with pomegranate and coriander raita, sweet pea guacamole on warm tortillas, lamb on rosemary skewers, pork satay, a spicy peanut satay sauce, a variety of quail eggs dishes, scrambled eggs with smoked eel on melba toast, tiny fish kebabs, cheat's tarts with goat cheese, ragged filo tartlets, a canape of fish and chips and grilled sourdough bread with garlic, olive oil and sea salt. it was all plated up beautifully and looked amazing. due to my lack of senses at the moment, i passed on tasting. instead, charlotte and i ran to cloyne over lunch to get more night nurse for our cottage.
afternoon lecture was all about sushi. a former ballymaloe student, shermin mustafa, taught us how to make the sushi rice and how to roll sushi as well as how to create scattered sushi and thin japanese omelets. she also made four turkish recipes as her dad is turkish. i so wished i could have tasted them because they looked amazing! one was called 'lamajun' which is a sort of lamb pizza. first it's cooked in a heavy skillet for a few minutes and then put in the oven under the grill for another 3-5 minutes. the dough is made from yogurt and flour and i bet would be good made on its own and used for dipping, nibbling, etc. the other dishes she made were a dolma, merjemec chorba and turkish bulghur.
once we had been dismissed for the day, charlotte, rose and i went for a stroll around the school gardens. the daffodils are up and they are gorgeous! such a happy flower, really. it was nice to enjoy the fresh air and the beautiful evening. when we got back to our cottage, i tackled the huge pile of recipes i had been meaning to file since last friday. it only took the better part of an hour. rumor has it that when we finish up the 12 week course, we get a bound book with all our recipes. if that's true, i feel like this filing has been a waste of time!
elisa is making dinner tonight - chicken, broccoli and rice casserole. ah, lovely comfort food. :)
08 March 2011
a lesson in patience
today was my first day back in the kitchen after being out sick yesterday and all weekend. actually, i probably should have heeded my mom's suggestion and stayed home one more day, but it's hard to miss any school when so much is packed into a single day. you can't afford to be sick at ballymaloe.
mom dropped me off at ballymaloe at quarter to eight this morning and helped me carry my bags to the pink cottage. elisa, my roommate, greeted us but sounded awful. unfortunately, she's caught a bug as well. :( she and i chatted briefly about the weekend and the exam review that had taken place monday evening (apparently it was a 2+ hour session with some pretty ridiculous questions). i made her some tea, shared some of my herbal goodies with her and then headed off to the kitchen.
my partner this week is stephen o'brien and he is a dream! since i had missed demo monday afternoon, i didn't know what any of the dishes were supposed to look like as a final product. stephen had emailed me a list of our menu items and the ones that he wanted to make, so i was scheduled to make oeufs mimosa salad with homemade mayonnaise, tomato and basil salad with ballymaloe french dressing, mushroom and caramelized onion salad and the ballymaloe vanilla ice cream. i started out by boiling 4 eggs for the mimosa salad and making the mayonnaise. once we've made the mayonnaise by hand, and have an instructor sign off on the technique, we're allowed to use a food processor to make it later on. i was very grateful for that today! while i was adding in the oil, one of the instructors came over to ask how i was feeling and to let me know that i had missed out on making butter on monday. bummed, i asked if it was something i could do again. she smiled, disappeared for a moment and then reappeared with a bucket of cream. so, i added 'making butter' to my order of work. my mayonnaise came together beautifully and i covered it with cling film and set it under my work station, out of the way. then i was on to the ice cream. not overly complicated, just tedious. especially the part where the sugar and water boil to the 'thread' stage. it happens very quickly and if you miss it, the sugar and water begin to caramelize. i hadn't factored redoing that step of making ice cream into my order of work, but i should have. my sugar and water caramelized right before my eyes and just as my instructor came over to check on me. we decided (she advised) that i was using a burner that was too hot. she poured water into my caramel goop so we could boil the pan clean and start over. 10-15 minute set back, not the end of the world.
the second time was a success and soon i had a kenmore whipping my cream into a softly whipped state while i used a hand mixer to incorporate the thready sugar water into my whisked egg yolks and vanilla. when the sugar water and egg yolks were a thick, creamy consistency, i folded in the cream, poured the mixture into ramekins and put the lot into the freezer. ice cream, done.
i cleaned up my section and gathered the ingredients for the mushroom and caramelized onion salad. i sliced up the onions and set them aside as stephen was using our large heavy bottom saucepan at the moment. i began to slice mushrooms and thought i was doing a great job until my instructor appeared and let me know my slices were much too thick. she went out into the larder and came back over to me with a handful of button mushrooms and had me practice after she did a quick demo for me. i will get it right one of these days! i sliced up three mushrooms in front of her before she was convinced i had the hang of it and added them to the mound i would later be sauteing.
while all the mushroom slicing was going on, stephen had finished with the saucepan, washed it out and returned it to the stove for me. i know, he's great! i dropped in two tablespoons of olive oil, let the pan get hot and then added my onions. caramelizing onions at ballymaloe is an art and one that takes time. because of the few setbacks i had, my onions were started a bit late and ended up a bit rushed. i found myself trying to finish up and plate the mimosa salad while i was caramelizing the onions and sauteing the mushrooms, so i gave up on the mushrooms and focused on the salad and onions for the moment. the salad consists of hard boiled eggs, yolks removed and peeled shrimp placed in the yolk holes which are covered with a mayonnaise and egg yolk mixture and then covered with a thinned out mayonnaise dressing. delicious, right? yeah, not something i will probably ever make again.
with the mimosa salad finished and plated and the onions finally caramelized, i concentrated on sauteing my mushrooms. another challenge of cooking and not completely recovered from being sick is that i had no sense of taste or smell. definitely hard to season my salads! i did my best to cover each batch of mushrooms with salt, pepper, garlic and a bit of lemon juice but i'm not sure how accurate i was. the mushrooms had to cool after being cooked, so i transferred them to a glass bowl and set them aside. i turned to focus on the tomato and basil salad and realized that i had used every spoon in the drawer and had a nice pile of bowls and saucepans on the stove. before i could decide which pile to take to the sink first, stephen had swooped in and was on his way to wash them up. what a star! i sighed, scolded myself for not being more on top of my cleaning and started slicing tomatoes. fortunatey, the tomato and basil salad is fantastically simple and all i had to do was season and dress the tomatoes before i called the salad done. a quick check of my watch and i had to do a double take. one o'clock? really? my slowest day in the kitchen so far. ugh. i plated my mushroom and caramelized salad, added it to the collection of plates holding my other two salads, pulled a ramekin of my ice cream from the freezer and called my instructor over to taste it all.
aside from needing a bit more seasoning on the mushrooms, everything turned out well. i actually got the seasoning perfect on the tomatoes which was complete luck. while my instructor recorded my scores, i moved my salads onto serving plates so they could be eaten for lunch. there wasn't much to tidy in my section because stephen had taken care of everything, so i packed up my knives, organized my recipes and headed back to the cottage. elisa was up but still feeling awful. i told her about my slow morning, changed out of my whites and went for a short walk. my route took me down the side of the school and back behind the greenhouses. it felt good to breathe in the cold air and watch the pigs move around in their pen. i walked for twenty minutes and then headed back up to the school for demo.
darina, who is recently back from india, shared with us some indian cuisine. she started off with a ciabatta bread (i know, not indian) and then moved on to a mild madras curry with fresh spices, hot chilli sauce, a grape raita, grape and melon with mint salad, melon sorbet with lime syrup, campari and blood orange sorbet, tamarind chutney with bananas, poori, naan, chapatis, lassi, pears poached in a saffron syrup, agen stuffed prunes with rosewater cream and yoghurt and cardamom cream with pomegranate seeds perfumed with rose blossom water. gillian, one of the instructors here, was assisting darina and had a hard time doing anything 'right' by darina's standards. she does an amazing job setting up all the ingredients for the dishes darina puts together and is always thinking four or five steps of darina and anticipating her next three moves. it was hard for me to see her so under-appreciated today.
since i couldn't taste anything and was still feeling lousy, i headed straight home after demo.
my hot water bottle is full, i have a pile of blankets on my bed and my night nurse ready is to knock me out for the evening. i'm looking forward to a good sleep. :)
mom dropped me off at ballymaloe at quarter to eight this morning and helped me carry my bags to the pink cottage. elisa, my roommate, greeted us but sounded awful. unfortunately, she's caught a bug as well. :( she and i chatted briefly about the weekend and the exam review that had taken place monday evening (apparently it was a 2+ hour session with some pretty ridiculous questions). i made her some tea, shared some of my herbal goodies with her and then headed off to the kitchen.
my partner this week is stephen o'brien and he is a dream! since i had missed demo monday afternoon, i didn't know what any of the dishes were supposed to look like as a final product. stephen had emailed me a list of our menu items and the ones that he wanted to make, so i was scheduled to make oeufs mimosa salad with homemade mayonnaise, tomato and basil salad with ballymaloe french dressing, mushroom and caramelized onion salad and the ballymaloe vanilla ice cream. i started out by boiling 4 eggs for the mimosa salad and making the mayonnaise. once we've made the mayonnaise by hand, and have an instructor sign off on the technique, we're allowed to use a food processor to make it later on. i was very grateful for that today! while i was adding in the oil, one of the instructors came over to ask how i was feeling and to let me know that i had missed out on making butter on monday. bummed, i asked if it was something i could do again. she smiled, disappeared for a moment and then reappeared with a bucket of cream. so, i added 'making butter' to my order of work. my mayonnaise came together beautifully and i covered it with cling film and set it under my work station, out of the way. then i was on to the ice cream. not overly complicated, just tedious. especially the part where the sugar and water boil to the 'thread' stage. it happens very quickly and if you miss it, the sugar and water begin to caramelize. i hadn't factored redoing that step of making ice cream into my order of work, but i should have. my sugar and water caramelized right before my eyes and just as my instructor came over to check on me. we decided (she advised) that i was using a burner that was too hot. she poured water into my caramel goop so we could boil the pan clean and start over. 10-15 minute set back, not the end of the world.
the second time was a success and soon i had a kenmore whipping my cream into a softly whipped state while i used a hand mixer to incorporate the thready sugar water into my whisked egg yolks and vanilla. when the sugar water and egg yolks were a thick, creamy consistency, i folded in the cream, poured the mixture into ramekins and put the lot into the freezer. ice cream, done.
i cleaned up my section and gathered the ingredients for the mushroom and caramelized onion salad. i sliced up the onions and set them aside as stephen was using our large heavy bottom saucepan at the moment. i began to slice mushrooms and thought i was doing a great job until my instructor appeared and let me know my slices were much too thick. she went out into the larder and came back over to me with a handful of button mushrooms and had me practice after she did a quick demo for me. i will get it right one of these days! i sliced up three mushrooms in front of her before she was convinced i had the hang of it and added them to the mound i would later be sauteing.
while all the mushroom slicing was going on, stephen had finished with the saucepan, washed it out and returned it to the stove for me. i know, he's great! i dropped in two tablespoons of olive oil, let the pan get hot and then added my onions. caramelizing onions at ballymaloe is an art and one that takes time. because of the few setbacks i had, my onions were started a bit late and ended up a bit rushed. i found myself trying to finish up and plate the mimosa salad while i was caramelizing the onions and sauteing the mushrooms, so i gave up on the mushrooms and focused on the salad and onions for the moment. the salad consists of hard boiled eggs, yolks removed and peeled shrimp placed in the yolk holes which are covered with a mayonnaise and egg yolk mixture and then covered with a thinned out mayonnaise dressing. delicious, right? yeah, not something i will probably ever make again.
with the mimosa salad finished and plated and the onions finally caramelized, i concentrated on sauteing my mushrooms. another challenge of cooking and not completely recovered from being sick is that i had no sense of taste or smell. definitely hard to season my salads! i did my best to cover each batch of mushrooms with salt, pepper, garlic and a bit of lemon juice but i'm not sure how accurate i was. the mushrooms had to cool after being cooked, so i transferred them to a glass bowl and set them aside. i turned to focus on the tomato and basil salad and realized that i had used every spoon in the drawer and had a nice pile of bowls and saucepans on the stove. before i could decide which pile to take to the sink first, stephen had swooped in and was on his way to wash them up. what a star! i sighed, scolded myself for not being more on top of my cleaning and started slicing tomatoes. fortunatey, the tomato and basil salad is fantastically simple and all i had to do was season and dress the tomatoes before i called the salad done. a quick check of my watch and i had to do a double take. one o'clock? really? my slowest day in the kitchen so far. ugh. i plated my mushroom and caramelized salad, added it to the collection of plates holding my other two salads, pulled a ramekin of my ice cream from the freezer and called my instructor over to taste it all.
aside from needing a bit more seasoning on the mushrooms, everything turned out well. i actually got the seasoning perfect on the tomatoes which was complete luck. while my instructor recorded my scores, i moved my salads onto serving plates so they could be eaten for lunch. there wasn't much to tidy in my section because stephen had taken care of everything, so i packed up my knives, organized my recipes and headed back to the cottage. elisa was up but still feeling awful. i told her about my slow morning, changed out of my whites and went for a short walk. my route took me down the side of the school and back behind the greenhouses. it felt good to breathe in the cold air and watch the pigs move around in their pen. i walked for twenty minutes and then headed back up to the school for demo.
darina, who is recently back from india, shared with us some indian cuisine. she started off with a ciabatta bread (i know, not indian) and then moved on to a mild madras curry with fresh spices, hot chilli sauce, a grape raita, grape and melon with mint salad, melon sorbet with lime syrup, campari and blood orange sorbet, tamarind chutney with bananas, poori, naan, chapatis, lassi, pears poached in a saffron syrup, agen stuffed prunes with rosewater cream and yoghurt and cardamom cream with pomegranate seeds perfumed with rose blossom water. gillian, one of the instructors here, was assisting darina and had a hard time doing anything 'right' by darina's standards. she does an amazing job setting up all the ingredients for the dishes darina puts together and is always thinking four or five steps of darina and anticipating her next three moves. it was hard for me to see her so under-appreciated today.
since i couldn't taste anything and was still feeling lousy, i headed straight home after demo.
my hot water bottle is full, i have a pile of blankets on my bed and my night nurse ready is to knock me out for the evening. i'm looking forward to a good sleep. :)
28 February 2011
all is quiet in kitchen 2
back in the kitchen after a relaxing, recharging weekend. i was on salad duty this morning so i was in at five to eight. another student and i took all the leaves and ran them through the giant salad spinner and then separated all the butterhead leaves from their bases, washed them carefully and then spun them out. the larder is where the salad duty takes place as well as stock duty and all prep for the afternoon demo, so there were a number of students and teachers working in the small, narrow room. i finished up at quarter to nine, grabbed my recipes and knives and headed back to kitchen 2 for week 2.
my partner this week is one of my cottagemates, lisa. i haven't really mentioned her. she's american, from the bay area but now lives in portland. she lives on the opposite end of the cottage and has an outside entrance to her room, so she can come and go as she pleases without ever seeing the rest of us. she doesn't typically join us when we do group dinners or if we're just sitting around in the evenings. but again, every student is here for his or her own reasons.
it was a quiet morning in the kitchen and everyone's workloads were quite light. i only had to make a curried parsnip soup with parsnip crisps and gingered mushrooms for lisa's hamburgers. i made my soup first, tasting it and checking the seasoning over and over. the gingered mushrooms were straightforward: flat mushrooms sliced thinly, cooked with onion, garlic, ginger, butter and cream.
lunch was served a bit early today as everyone had finished cooking by half eleven. i tried one of the lamb burgers with pesto, a piece of bleu cheese and my usual salad greens. it was a beautiful, sunny day today and most students hurried through lunch so they could enjoy being outside. i enjoyed the sun and a bit of a walk before heading back for afternoon demo.
darina, gillian and pam taught us all about making homemade pasta and the dishes that can be made from them. lasagna, fettuccine alfredo, ragu sauce, ravioli, etc. and of course there were desserts! tiramisu, panacotta, and a walnut cake with 'american' frosting.
grace, hazel and i skipped the tasting and took advantage of the sun and ran the loop. it was a good run considering grace only had 7 hours sleep all weekend, hazel hadn't run since monday and i wasn't overly excited about the run to begin with. when i got back to the pink cottage, elisa and rose were sitting at the dining room table having tea, so i made myself a cup and we talked about our weekends and the day behind us. connie came in a bit later looking for a tennis partner and i took her up on it. it was a pretty hilarious sight as we didn't have much light. we volleyed a few times before we decided it would be dangerous to keep going. however, we're both keen to get out and play again soon.
emily and charlotte have just gotten back from the gym, connie and ellen are outside the cottage visiting, elisa is also on her computer and minnie is up in her room. it's a quiet evening in the pink cottage, one that i quite enjoy.
my plan for the evening consists of my order of work for tomorrow and then bed. i'm beat!
my partner this week is one of my cottagemates, lisa. i haven't really mentioned her. she's american, from the bay area but now lives in portland. she lives on the opposite end of the cottage and has an outside entrance to her room, so she can come and go as she pleases without ever seeing the rest of us. she doesn't typically join us when we do group dinners or if we're just sitting around in the evenings. but again, every student is here for his or her own reasons.
it was a quiet morning in the kitchen and everyone's workloads were quite light. i only had to make a curried parsnip soup with parsnip crisps and gingered mushrooms for lisa's hamburgers. i made my soup first, tasting it and checking the seasoning over and over. the gingered mushrooms were straightforward: flat mushrooms sliced thinly, cooked with onion, garlic, ginger, butter and cream.
lunch was served a bit early today as everyone had finished cooking by half eleven. i tried one of the lamb burgers with pesto, a piece of bleu cheese and my usual salad greens. it was a beautiful, sunny day today and most students hurried through lunch so they could enjoy being outside. i enjoyed the sun and a bit of a walk before heading back for afternoon demo.
darina, gillian and pam taught us all about making homemade pasta and the dishes that can be made from them. lasagna, fettuccine alfredo, ragu sauce, ravioli, etc. and of course there were desserts! tiramisu, panacotta, and a walnut cake with 'american' frosting.
grace, hazel and i skipped the tasting and took advantage of the sun and ran the loop. it was a good run considering grace only had 7 hours sleep all weekend, hazel hadn't run since monday and i wasn't overly excited about the run to begin with. when i got back to the pink cottage, elisa and rose were sitting at the dining room table having tea, so i made myself a cup and we talked about our weekends and the day behind us. connie came in a bit later looking for a tennis partner and i took her up on it. it was a pretty hilarious sight as we didn't have much light. we volleyed a few times before we decided it would be dangerous to keep going. however, we're both keen to get out and play again soon.
emily and charlotte have just gotten back from the gym, connie and ellen are outside the cottage visiting, elisa is also on her computer and minnie is up in her room. it's a quiet evening in the pink cottage, one that i quite enjoy.
my plan for the evening consists of my order of work for tomorrow and then bed. i'm beat!
27 February 2011
happy today, just happy to be here
a perfect day:
a rainbow in the field.
a morning walk along the harbor with mom and fionnbarre.
breakfast with mom and dad. omelets, toast and coffee.
sailing with peter o'rourke, mom and dad.
homemade chocolate chip cookies.
dinner with elisa, charlotte, mom and dad. flank steak, pork tenderloin, sweet potatoes, mushrooms and onions and guinness cupcakes. talking, laughing, telling stories.
a rainbow in the field.
a morning walk along the harbor with mom and fionnbarre.
breakfast with mom and dad. omelets, toast and coffee.
sailing with peter o'rourke, mom and dad.
homemade chocolate chip cookies.
dinner with elisa, charlotte, mom and dad. flank steak, pork tenderloin, sweet potatoes, mushrooms and onions and guinness cupcakes. talking, laughing, telling stories.
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