Sarah Had A Little Lamb (and A LOT of Artichokes!)

A few of my readers have asked me why I’ve taken so long to write about last week’s “White Box” workshop, the dry-run for our upcoming exam.  Truth is, I’ve been struggling with a little writer’s block again and I needed a few days to figure out exactly what I wanted to say about it.

The White Box followed the same format and process as the upcoming exam.  We were given a theme (in this case “Spring Dinner for Two”), a list of three techniques from which we must choose at least two (sauce hollandaise or a derivative, farce fine, and turned vegetables), a list of mandatory ingredients (150g of salmon, 1 orange, 100g of goat cheese, and 5 artichokes), and a list of optional ingredients.  About 72 hours to come up with a menu, bon d’economat, and recipes, and then a week to panic.  Pretty straight forward, eh?

Once I got the list of ingredients and the theme, a few things jumped out at me right away.  First, 150g isn’t much salmon.   It’s enough for an appetizer for two, maybe. That meant that I was going to need to grab at least one of the two other proteins (scallops and rack of lamb) listed in the optional ingredients.  Then the little matter of five (!) artichokes.  Artichokes are a pain in the ass and five is a weird number when making two plates.  Arrrgggggh…….

 A short chat with my friend and mentor The Stig and I was in a much better mood.  He helped me come up with a plan that would use all three techniques, make use of that odd numbered artichoke, and be a little more creative than the obvious things like stuffed lamb chops. I can’t even begin to explain how grateful I was to have a plan so quickly and to then have the time to spend on the bon d’economat and recipes – more than a few people in my class stayed up all night to get theirs done and I (for a change) slept soundly.

So my menu:  Appetizer of salmon mousse napoleon, seared scallop, wilted spinach and orange and herb hollandaise.  Main of lamb chops with goat cheese crust and duxelle of oyster mushrooms, spaetzle, glazed turnips and braised artichokes.  And that fifth artichoke?  Blended into the spaetzle to make it “disappear”.  Easy, right?

The morning of the workshop (a week later), I was up at the crack of dawn.  I had to be in a little early anyway since it was again my turn to be the class sous-chef.  Two Turkish coffees and a breakfast of leftover pheasant had me in a sparkling mood.  Set up for the class was a little more chaotic than usual since every student was getting a slightly different basket based on their submitted recipes.

And as I mentioned in my previous post we had Chef 3 for this workshop.  Chef 3 hadn’t seen any of us cook since the end of Intermediate in mid-March, so the workshop wasn’t just a dry-run for the exam, it was an opportunity to find out if we’d actually learned anything this term.  No pressure!

I was pretty calm the first part of the workshop.  Got my salmon mousse (farce fine) put together quickly, baked the phyllo pastry for the napoleon (without burning it!) and got started on the mise en place for my main, including turning all those damned artichokes.  The only thing that went wrong?  My hollandaise broke about a minute before I needed it on the plate.  Fuck.  I grabbed a bowl, some cold water and whisked for dear life.  It came back to life just in the nick of time.

 

Chef 3 seemed fairly pleased with my plates.  A little suggestion or two on plating but nothing serious.  I was in a pretty good mood and decided get a smile out of him.

“Chef, do I get extra points for my hollandaise if it broke but I saved it?”

Chef 3 stared at me blankly for about two seconds and then started to laugh.

“Unfortunately no, Sarah!”

Once everyone had plated their appetizers, Chef 3 had us tidy up and sent us on a half hour long break.  I had managed to get some of my mise en place done for my main, but not all of it.  About 20 minutes into the break I started freaking out a little, realizing that I had A LOT of work to do.

The second part of the workshop was, for me, an exercise in controlling panic.  I made a hash of butchering the lamb – something that isn’t my strong suit anyway, but doing it under a time crunch was awful.  I hacked away at it and got it done, but it was less than pretty.  My turned turnips were also a little less than pretty, but at least I didn’t burn them.  I don’t even want to discuss my sauce, except to say that I can do a whole lot better than what ended up on the plate.

 

The verdict?  Artichokes were lukewarm, at best.  Not the prettiest or most colourful plate (no kidding, eh?), but the lamb was properly cooked and things seemed to taste okay.  Honestly, I was just happy that I managed to get all the elements of my dish on the plate.  I wasn’t thrilled, but it was on time and edible.

The lessons from this for my upcoming exam?

1.       Maximize the “easy” points.  The submitted menu, bon d’economat, and recipes are worth a significant piece of the mark, so it’s worth spending the time to get these right and presentable.  I think I did pretty well on this part.

2.       Focus on technique rather than the ingredients. The ingredients may not be sexy, but that doesn’t mean the plate can’t be interesting with good use of technique.

3.        Focus on the things I know how to do well, and practice the things I don’t. What I did to that lamb was less than dignified and messed up my timing.  No excuse for that.

4.       MISE EN PLACE!!!!!!!!

So another week of class ahead.  We won’t have the list of ingredients or the theme of our final exam for a few days yet so there isn’t much planning I can do, but that doesn’t mean I’m not thinking about it constantly.

I can’t believe how time has flown.