Day fifteen: Where we revisit our old nemesis; pork
Posted on | January 18, 2010
The sheer amount of information we learn at this school is incredible. So much so, that you can tell that a helluva lot of thought has been poured into all sorts of details surrounding our education.
Thought, yes, but execution?
We have yet to be given a syllabus for this, our third, and last, term. Now, we have been given some four-day syllabus’ periodically. But once those end, we have no idea what is coming up until the Chef gives us another four-day syllabus.
This morning, I am between four-day syllabus’. Which means I am flying blind.
What is a pigs favorite ballet?
~ Swine lake!
So we get to school and jump right into a mirepoix challenge. The goal: Four stalks of celery, two carrots, two onions, medium dice, in eight minutes.
I had one disadvantage and one bit of serendipity: I was cutting without my glasses which meant everything was slightly out of focus. Big disadvantage. And one of my onion halves slipped our of my hand and fell into the garbage can as I was peeling it. A surprise (and somewhat shocking) advantage!
But I made it in eight minutes, just barely, so they two things seemed to have balanced out.
Then we got another one of those four-day syllabus’. This one was for today, tomorrow, and the two following days. Beyond that? The Chef said we might do risotto and lobster. What kind of risotto and what we are actually doing with the lobster is anyone’s guess.
As for this four-day syllabus, we are doing pork.
Oh joy. How I love pork. (Are you reading the sarcasm here? If you have not been following this blog, then you should know that, outside of bacon and pancetta, I loathe pork. I won’t eat it. I prefer not to cook with it, if I have a choice. And I can’t imagine anything more disgusting than a big, old, glistening ham.)
And not only are we doing pork, but we are turning some of it into sausages. Another food I can do without (on the bright side, however, the husband loves pork sausages, so at least I have a willing audience if I bring some home. And I always try to bring my food home so he can taste it.).
Today, according to the syllabus, the plan was to get started on the sausages and the pork cheeks and turn those ham hocks into stock.
We got the stock going and got partially into the other tasks, but some of the meat we needed was missing. So we ended up finishing early and just milled around, waiting for the next class to start.
Execution.
What does the little pig get every morning from its parents?
~ Hogs and kisses!
Chef Peacock, our kitchen Chef (we no longer have two Chefs in the kitchen, just one) is a good teacher: Clear and patient with very clear demonstrations. But what I like best about him is the atmosphere of teamwork he keeps trying to foster.
I say “keeps trying to foster” because once the class is left to its own devices, it instantly reverts to “me, me, me.”
See, when some of our meat was missing, he told us to do as much as we could for the whole class. So Mama and I prepared the spice mixture for the sausages. Other students grouped together to prepare other items. And it was far more efficient and effective than everyone reaching for, say, the one spice grinder or the one container or fennel seeds or what have you.
The minute those group tasks were done, however, everyone seperated.
On the bright side, however, Mama, who works on my right, tends to pick up things for me while I tend to grab things for her. So, for example, when I needed quart containers for the mirepoix this morning, I grabbed enough for her, too.
It’s a lovely way to work. And, quite frankly, the way I had expected we would work in school.
I was wrong.
What do you call a pig with no clothes on?
~ Streaky bacon
And into the classroom we went for a lecture with the always nice Chef Pigtails on menu design and customer service.
The customer service portion was fairly surface and fairly predictable (but, really, is there anything of great depth or surprise to add to this topic?!). It was all customer service goes from the top down and empower your staff to address problems. Good advice, sure, but nothing new. At least, not to me.
But menu design was more intersting. Did you know, for example, that you should place your most expensive items in any given section at the top of the section and at the bottom of the section? So, for example, your most expensive entrees would be at the top and bottom of the entree section of a menu. That’s because people tend not to read a menu; just browse it. And those are the places we tend to browse.
And did you know you should not break out prices by, for example, placing them in a seperate column? This gives undue focus to the prices and people will tend toward the less expensive items.
There was also talk about upselling and suggestive selling and setting prices and all sorts of ways restaurants try to get you to buy more.
Now, I could talk about this here, or I can wait until we do the quiz tomorrow on this stuff and post that, instead, so you can try it and see what you know.
I think I’ll do that.
And, yes, I promise to post the answers, too.
Because information should be shared freely.
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3 Responses to “Day fifteen: Where we revisit our old nemesis; pork”
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January 19th, 2010 @ 10:14 am
Thinking of your mirepoix challenge… I marvel at the ability to chop onions in anything less than 15 minutes due to the tears. I have to walk away and come back. Several times. Any tips for getting past the tears so I don’t chop off (another) fingertip?
January 19th, 2010 @ 10:25 am
I asked a chef at school and he said the trick is to keep your knife good and sharp. The rationale is that the sharper knife damages less cells in the onion, releasing less irritant which means less tears.
I diced three shallots yesterday and I was fine for the first two, but by the time I got to my third, my eyes were stinging. I find a sharp knife helps, a lot, but does not eliminate all the tears.
If that doesn’t help, get someone else to cut your onions – no point sacrificing body parts!
Cheers!
February 11th, 2010 @ 11:11 am
Placing the onion in the fridge for a while before cutting helps a lot. If they are really bad, I use onion goggles, they work really well!