Le Cordon Bleu open house and french cooking demo

I went to the open house in Le Cordon Bleu Boston , I got to visit the classrooms----actually kitchens, and had an French cooking demonstration. I know it's a place that I am supposed to be in, I am always most happy cooking in the kitchen, there were hundreds of nice gears and lots of fresh ingredients, I wouldn't notice how time passed if I was cooking or experimenting there. But I can't make myself move on to become a student here  and change my whole life. At least now, it's not a right time for me. Maybe I just can 'love cooking with abandon', but I think I can 'cook with abandon', and I am not afraid to claim that.

Those are the 'classrooms'

This is the restaurant 'Technique(tek-neek)' for students, they will do cooking, serving and all the other kinds things in real world restaurants there. I got to see the menu, which is very tempting French cuisine , but with a good deal

This is the kit box that every student will get one on their first day. Then they only need to carry this whenever they go to school, no laptop please!

After the tour, there was a French cooking demo, Chef demostarted salmon two ways for us: poached and sauté with vegetable(fennel, zucchini , carrot, tomato ragu and sweet corn puree)

The two big screens are showing what is going on on the cooking table, this is also how it works when they teach

1. Make sweet corn puree

chef said, using a larger flat container, so the sweet corn will only be in the container but not everywhere

Also, using the back of the knife to do it another time, to get the sweet pulps. Chef also revealed a secrete about food, the real flavor is always in an uneatable parts, which is the best for making stock

So we saved the sticks for corn stock( some onion, garlic, thyme, bay leaves)

Next step is to saute the sweet corns. Heat pan with butter,  instead of throw sweet corns into the pan directly, Chef used a technique here, removed the pan from the stovetop, then added the sweet corns , it will prevent the corns from being browned. Then added corn stock, let it cook for 10 mins until fully cooked, used a blender to make puree

this is the sweet corns in corn stock

2. Making ragout, this is French ragout (main-dish stew), different from Italian tomato sauce ragu. Heat pan and butter, put all the ingredients into the pan, add fish stock and let it simmer. Chef pre-boiled the carrot, because it usually takes long for carrots to be cooked, and if you want to get fully cooked carrots by saute, it will lose the bright color, so the best way is to pre-boil them

When ragout was simmering, Chef showed us how to dice tomato, skinless, seedless ones. It involves cutting a cross on the top of the tomato, boiling it for 5 seconds, then remove the skin.

For me, it's a kind of waste, oh well, this is how fine dining works. 

At the end, Chef added the parsley butter, he made a day ahead, so the ragout turns into vivid green

3. Prepare salmon. 

For poached salmon. we need to remove the skin, Chef said: "cut into the skin 1 inch, pinch it, flip, take the skin off'.........but I really had a hard time doing this. > <'

Season the fillets and let them rest a few minutes, pat VERY VERY DRY. Don't put the salmon in to the pan until the pan is VERY VERY HOT(  my problem is, my nonstick griddle can never be very hot :(( , time to get new gears!)

seasoning salmon, always in a higher position to season more evenly

poached salmon in fish stock(lower left), saute salmon( upper, right)

this is something new: after skin side is done, flip it, pour out the oil from the pan, then add some butter into it

splash butter onto salmon

4. Plating: add ragout, add corn puree in the center, put the fillet on

Really nice , real, really ...

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Now my turn:

Making parsley butter: picked the leaves and boil them about 5 seconds, immediately put them into ice water. using a blender to make puree, whipped into softened butter.

For some reason I didn't get very fine parsley puree, I don't know if I should blame my awkward blender or my skills. 

I ended up with something like this, and this basically predicts the failure of my ragout

get corns and make stock

refining the puree

diced tomato

you can tell from the pattern on the skin, I used griddle pan, also I think I need a cast iron pan to get that perfect crust. 

It's easy to tell the differences between mine and the Chef's . A long way to go, immature chef Gaogao, well, I will be back to make them again1!