Spring Semester Grades

I already mentioned I got an A in my sanitation class. I checked the grades on my other two classes.

For my Cooking for Healthy Lifestyles class, we had to do a group practical final. We had to produce a healthy three course meal.

We decided on a Mediterranean style meal, with a pan-Middle Eastern style.I think it worked well. We did a good job working together as a team to produce both the menu and the final project.

For our appetizer, we made hummus, and served it with a variety of crudites.

This hummus was flavored with cilantro and a little jalapeno to give it a kick.

To be healthier, instead of using pita bread, we served it with celery, carrots, and yellow bell pepper. This also gave a lot of color to the plate.

For our main dish, we had a bed of couscous with peas and raisins. On top of that was Lebanese Orange Chicken.

To accompany the meal is a Greek salad with marinated onions and cucumbers, kalamata olives, tomatoes, and julienned carrots.

Also with the dish are spicy Moroccan style vegetables with sweet potato, leek, onion, and zucchini.

For our dessert, we made a coconut milk panna cotta with fresh strawberries.

To make it more vegan friendly, it was made with agar agar instead of gelatin. It is garnished with a little toasted coconut.

We can't complain. We got an a on the final, and with that and 100% on my written final, I secured a solid A for that class.

For my cake decorating class, our final project was to make a dummy wedding cake. The core of the cake was Styrofoam, as the object of this exam was testing decorating skill, not cake baking.

My partner and I chose to make an Indian inspired cake. We used the peacock, lotus blossoms, and henna patterns in the design of the cake.

The cake is covered in a light ivory fondant. We wanted a blank canvas for the elaborate decorations we had planned.

The body of the peacock is made of colored fondant.

The tail is piped royal frosting.

The lotus blossoms are made from wafer paper. They were cut out, air brushed, then assembled.

on the other side are some fondant ropes framing piped henna patterns in purple and gold.

I'm really proud of this cake. I think it came out quite nice. We scored a 9.4 out of ten on it.

I managed an A+ in this class, which was a better grade than I thought I would get. I was expecting a B or at best a B+.

This was a relatively unstressful semester, though I did occasionally get stressed out over my lack of piping skills.

Next up for summer: Sugar work, and fruit carving.

World Tea Expo 2014 Introduction

Just got back From the World Tea Expo 2014. This year, it was held in Long Beach Ca., which was nice for me, as it is a short drive, and I have friends in the area to crash with, so I saved a lot of money I would otherwise had to spend on a hotel room. This was my second year attending. Last year the spouse and I attended the New Business Boot Camp, which included the World Tea Tasting Tour, which I discussed in two parts, here and here.

This year, I went alone. I focused on taking classes, but also did some networking, and talking to vendors. I'd like to have a small stock of teas to offer.

One of my goals at the Expo is to expand and educate my own palate. I mostly focused on tasting single source teas, rather than on blends, or flavored teas. Flavored blends, especially fruity, spicy, and floral teas, are hugely popular in the US. They are, however, kind of the wine coolers of the tea world. Everyone sells them, because that is what people buy, but what we want them to love are the subtle and complex teas, the equivalent of aged varietal wines. I find myself intrigued by the variation within tea, and want to have some ability to guide others.

One thing I love about the Expo is the energy. It has a positive energy unlike any other professional convention I've been to. I think this is because one does not casually become a tea professional. Running a tea business does not top the Forbes list of fast riches jobs. Everyone there is there because of passion. We can all geek out on tea together.

I also love the cosmopolitan nature of the Expo. Not only did I meet great people from all over the US, I talked to people from Canada, Great Britain, New Zealand, Australia, Japan, Korea, China, Taiwan, Sri Lanka, India, Nepal, Thailand, Kenya, Malawi, and more. I love that you have people in every attire from three piece business suits to cargo shorts and tie-die t-shirts happily chatting.

I will write more on the classes I had the opportunity to take, and some of the products and companies.

Cake Decorating Class: S'mores Cupcakes

We had our first lab for our cake decorating class. The first half of the semester will be more focused on baking and construction, and the second half more on decoration.

We started off with something fairly easy. We started a cheesecake, which we will finish in the next class session. We also did S'mores cupcakes, that while fairly simple, looked and tasted great.

These cupcakes are a rich chocolate cake with chocolate ganache, graham cracker crumbs, Swiss meringue, and a little square of milk chocolate with smoked salt. We baked it in a square shape.

We torched the meringue to give it the toasted marshmallow flavor. The smoked salt was to give it a little taste of the campfire.

I really liked the look and taste of this cupcake. It manages to be both homey and elegant.

We did not explicitly cover the recipe for the ganache, but I expect it is probably the one here. For the chocolate, we tempered milk chocolate, and spread it thin on a sheet of acetate. It was sprinkled with smoked salt, and allowed to harden. It was then cut into squares.

S'mores Cupcakes

Chocolate Cupcakes

dry ingredients:

5 oz. by wt. all purpose flour

7 oz. by wt. sugar

1 1/2 oz. by wt. cocoa powder

1 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

wet ingredients:

1 egg

2 oz. by vol. vegetable oil

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

4 oz. by vol. brewed coffee

4 oz. by vol. buttermilk

Pre-heat oven to 350 F. 

Sift together dry ingredients. Whisk together wet ingredients in a separate bowl. Add dry ingredients to wet, mix until well combined.

Scoop into lined cupcake pan. Bake 18 - 22 minutes. Makes 12 cupcakes.

Swiss Meringue

4 egg whites

8 oz. by wt. sugar

3/4 tsp. cream of tartar

1/8 tsp. salt

Heat all ingredients in a double boiler over simmering water while whisking continuously. Heat to 165 F. Transfer to a stand mixer and whip on high until cooled to room temperature.

Happy Eating!

Healthy Lifestyles Class: Healthy Appetizers

Last week in my Healthy lifestyles class, we were to make a number of healthy appetizers/ hor d'oeuvres. We were given a number of recipes to work from. One of the interesting things about the way Chef Kim organizes his labs is that he doesn't micromanage us. He gives us recipes, but gives us leave to deviate from them in our own creative fashion. Also, he basically gives us a goal, gives us product to work with, then lets us work out how it gets done.

As a group, we were to make four appetizers, two hor d'oeuvres, and a salad. We had four recipes given us, and we were to adapt two of them to work as hor d'oeuvres. For the salad, we were on our own to create something. Presentation was to be a big part of things.

I made both an appetizer and an hor d'oeuvre from the recipe for Vietnamese style spring rolls. They were very similar to the ones I did for my Pan Asian dinner. The rolls have cooked shrimp, lettuce, rice noodles, julienned carrot and daikon radish, cilantro, and slivers of yellow bell pepper.

The dipping sauce is a mix of rice wine vinegar, fish sauce, lemon juice, sugar, garlic, and sriracha.

I garnished the plate with a little minced peanuts.

For the smaller version, I cut the rice paper wrappers in half, and  left out the shredded lettuce.

This is a great, refreshing appetizer. Very healthy, with no added fat.

For the salad, I collaborated with one of my teammates on a seafood salad, using some of my leftover shrimp, and some of the scallops from another appetizer made by a different teammate.

We included mixed greens, sauteed baby shitake mushrooms, tomato, and some sweet yellow and orange peppers. My teammate made a nice vinaigrette to go with it.

All and all, I'm happy with both the flavors and presentations we did. Chef had some minor critiques, some ideas for improvement, but there were no terrible missteps.

Sanitation Class final grade

Finished the one credit sanitation class with an A. Other than memorizing specific temperatures for specific foods, it was really just a matter of common sense and be aware of what you are doing.

Roots and Greens

We got our second box from Farm Fresh to You today. This was a good haul this week. It was heavy on the root vegetables and greens. For greens, we got lettuce, green cabbage, kale, and frisee. I see a lot of salad in the near future. I haven't worked with frisee before. From what I can find, it seems to be best eaten raw, with an acidic vinaigrette.

For roots, we were given beets, fennel, carrots, and radishes. I kept the greens from all of these as well. The spouse is not a huge fan of fennel, but I enjoy it in small amounts. I have a couple of beets left from the last box, so am planning on pickling and canning all of them.

We also got some fruit. An avocado, a pint of strawberries, four blood oranges, and a couple of navel oranges. Need to do something cool with orange and strawberries.

Looking forward to playing with everything.

Healthy Lifestyles Class: First Cooking Lab

We finally got around to actually cooking in my healthy lifestyles class. It is interesting to note the significant difference in how Chef Kim organizes his labs vs. how Chef Joe does. Chef Joe is a very rigid authoritarian. He requires everyone to wait to do anything until he authorizes the specific action. He also allows only limited variation from his recipes for the session.

In  contrast, Chef Kim gave us a pile of material, six techniques to demonstrate, and freedom to decide which vegetables to use for which techniques, how to cut the vegetables, and who was to do what. It was an interesting experience.

We were given some zucchini and yellow squash, carrots, tomatoes, and broccoli. We were to demonstrate six techniques: sauteing, stir frying, steaming, poaching, braising, and en papillote (in parchment). The other members of my team quickly claimed various methods, leaving sauteing and braising for me. I was the only one to do two techniques.

I thin sliced some carrots, yellow, and green squash for sauteing. I was happy that I was able to saute the vegetables just by flipping them in the pan. I did not use a spoon or spatula at all. I cooked the carrots for about a minute before adding the squash. It went quickly, as it should.

I then went back and thick cut some of each squash for braising, and cut up some chunks of tomato. I seasoned some water with salt and pepper. Once it was up to a simmer, I added the squash and covered the pan. I let it cook for a bit, then added the tomatoes. Once the squash was cooked, I removed it from the water.

I felt I did a good job. My team thought the braised veggies were the best, and the sauteed the second best. Chef liked both as well, and thought I had properly cut the vegetables for both. The only criticism was that I had been a tad aggressive with the pepper in the sauteed veggies, and I think that was a fair cop.

We also were to create two flavored vinegars and a flavored oil for doing salads next week. We made a red wine vinegar with blueberries and lemon, and a white wine vinegar with thyme and lemon. For the oil, we went with a classic, garlic and rosemary. Apparently so did all the other tables, independently.

Should be an interesting semester.