Oh, Baby!

This is a song is dedicated to my first! Play first, then read while music is playing. (Only because I need this type of epic-ness in my life.)This song should play every time I walk into a room--in slow motion.


Now, let me get to what I was meaning to write about. People have asked me in the past after learning that I was into cooking, "What is your favorite thing to cook?" I have a hard to answering that question because I personally think I know absolutely NOTHING when it comes to cooking any dish. I cannot cook a single dish to perfection every single time. Justly so, I do not feel confident cooking anything really. But after yesterday and tonight passed me by I have come to announce that my favorite food to make or bake is a SOUFFLE!

(photo credits to Erica Ko, 2010.)


Ah yes, the souffle. Let me tell you about the essence that makes a souffle.
Even when the souffle falls and is a failure in every way, the process is incredibly exhilarating. Watching the oven has never been so exciting! When a souffle starts to rise, it is like watching a child's chest rising and falling ever so gently after taking in his precious first breaths from the world he just has emerged. A little over the top? Maybe just a smidge.



Eating the souffle is equally enjoyable. Breaking the top shell into the molten, goodness in the middle--heavenly and divine. The end.

Making souffles are surprisingly easy and versatile. The most important ingredient is the whipped egg whites. It gives the souffle structure. It gives the souffle its rise. You can make a chocolate souffle by adding melted chocolate into the egg whites. You can make a berry souffle by adding some sort of berry sauce or whatever concoction you create and add it to the egg whites. You can make a cheese souffle by adding cheese to egg whites. It's that easy! I don't measure the ingredients, which gives me a sense of freedom from the traditional baking, where you have to measure baking ingredients perfectly. It's fun! It's easy! It's delicious! It's sexy! It's everything you could ever ask for and MORE! Try it. You'll be hooked. I already am.

Potential Opportunities Come With Increased Anxiety

So! I am keeping my fingers crossed over and over and over again for this single opportunity. What is this opportunity you speak of, Jean? Well, let me jolly well tell you! I MIGHT get an internship at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Yes! It is exciting news and I am so greatful for even having the chance at it. The only difficult thing is no matter how hard I try to stay positive my insecurities have been taking over a lot of my thought processes lately, especially because this is something i deeply care about. I am afraid I am going to disappoint those I am working under. I am afraid to make a mistake. I am afraid of failure. I know, we learn through our failures, but failure is one thing I just cannot stand! It haunts me like an overbearing stalker that refuses to disappear even with a restraining order. I am so disturbed to the point that I question if every little action I do will disappoint or offend my potential boss. It is actually become quite stressful as it is silly. I need to man up and take the God forsake bull by his horns and tame the beast like a domestic puppy dog. Please wish me luck!

On the more amusing side of things, I noticed that it was just my luck in which I sent an email to the chef and spelled his name incorrectly. I butchered the man's name with confidence. FML! Good thing he was a good sport about it.

Quote of the day @ school.
Chef: Can someone man this? (referring to stirring a pot of heavy cream that is being heated)
Brit: or WOMAN it.

Thank You. I love you!

I love it when people read my blog. I feel so grateful, even giddy at times. It really means a lot to me. When people tell me they read my blog, I reply with a bashful smile when i really want to give you a hug and a huge, sloppy kiss. I feel like my blog has a long way to go in terms of story telling, pictures, entertainment, engaging readers, and being worthwhile. So thank you to all who take time out of the busy schedules to give this blog the light of day. I have a good story to tell (maybe it will be more a crazy rant or babble) but I dont have a picture. I'm waiting on it. Exxes and Ohs.

Happy Mother's Day

I love my momma and that is why I decided to feed her.
#1.) French Onion Soup


#2.) Caesar Salad
What a complete failure. For some unknown reason, I confidently thought Caesar Salad consisted of these four ingredients: egg, garlic, anchovy, and oil. I was off by like 6 other ingredients.


#3.) Chicken Cordon Bleu
Failure number 2. I thought for sure we had 4 chicken breasts available. Turns out we only had two. I also had a hard time stuffing the chicken breast, I almost turned into hulk mode in the midst of making the chicken.


#4.) Chocolate Souffle.
I made this actually a day before Mother's Day. It was my first time making it and my first time eating one as well. So I really had no idea if it was actually successful or not. It rose...so I deemed it successful. It really is a sexy dessert, but when it started getting messy I started getting a little green (reference to hulk). I even yelled at my sister like a meany. Oh well, I made up for it with the souffle. Good times.
fresh out of the oven

Finished product

Reality Check

As I learn to make new dishes I find myself thinking that all of this is pretty easy.
Then I watch a video of an successful, expert, master chef create the exact same dish, explaining the process with such depth that parallels the complexities of equations attempting to demonstrate the processes of the universe. The finished product is sexy in it's purest form. That is when I realize that I am way behind, and this is beyond easy. It will take years to create a simple dish to be that desirable. It's a sinking feeling. It's almost quite overwhelming at times. It almost seems like a goal far beyond my reach. But with the prospect that I will only be taking forward steps, no matter how small, I learn to love it.

Fatty Life

Sorry for my lack of updating you on what I have been cooking up and learning. I've been busy for the most part. Busy is good, but it really does wear me down by the end of the day, which makes waking up extremely difficult. Hey, I'm doing what I love so I am going to try not to complain about the chef with ADD and having to get to school an hour early so that I can find parking. No, I'm not going to do that. Instead, I am going to post up pictures of food because that makes everything better, doesn't it?
BISCUITS

And yes, those are butter pats melting on top of freshly made and perfectly flaky biscuits. Delicious biscuits makes all things better.

POTATOES DUCHESSE (sp)

I am too lazy at the moment to look up the correct spelling for this little piece of heaven. Boil some russets in water until fork tender. Mash or put through a mill. We don't want any clumps of potato in there. Season. Add 1 egg and egg yolks until the potatoes have a desirable yellow color to them. Put in a piping bag with a star tip. Pipe. (I suck at piping. =() Coat with melted butter on top of the potatoes. Bake until golden brown. Sweet Jesus, I swear to you these potatoes are absolutely fantastic with a crust holding a cloud-like perfection together. Try it! it's easy!

RISOTTO

Risottos are sexy. Enough said.
Use arborio rice like the Italians do it. Start off by sweating onions in some butter until translucent. Then add the rice, making sure each grain is coated with the fat. Add chicken stock one ladle at a time allowing the liquid to reduce between the ladling in more chicken stock. Make sure to keep stirring and most importantly be patient. Keep adding until rice is tender to taste. Then add Parmesan cheese liberally. After having a good risotto, you can die happy.


GENOISE (or Sponge Cake)


This cake is simply some flour, eggs, sugar, butter. Our cake wasn't perfect but it was still tasty. The only issue was that the eggs act as a leavener rather than using baking powder to help the cake rise. So, you need a good amount of eggs. With that, you risk having an eggy taste in the finished produce. Chef told us we could make a syrup for the cake to soak up for a moister texture. We made a kiwi syrup and whipped up some cream. slathered that on the genoise sheet cake and rolled it up to make a roll cake. After putting it in the blast chiller for a bit this was yummy to the tummy indeed.

I love food.
Good day.

Breaking the Curse

I have this curse. The curse of wearing glasses. Don't get my wrong, glasses aren't that horrible. But they seem to have a horrible effect on me, they make me feel incredibly tired ALL DAY LONG by making my eyelids feel heavy and my eyes feel weary. The strange thing is once I put in my contacts or remove my glasses I immediately feel free and my eyes feel as if they can breath. My glasses are a chamber, a barrier, stifling my eyes, my body, and my mind from being awake. My body moves at a slower pace and I swear I feel as if I am induced some kind of drug when my glasses are on. This is why I dread wearing glasses. However, after using up my last pair of contacts I must now weight for the new arrivals and for the mean time I must wear my glasses. I hate doing activity while wearing glasses because I feel like I am unable to do any sort of activity, including cooking.
Good thing cooking totally woke me up. I forgot about my glasses, except when steam fogged it and when my glasses started sliding down my nose. Ugh, annoying. I was sweating so much! It was so hot! I later saw that my face was as red as a ripened tomato. I couldn't stop sweating, because I had been slaving over the stove for OVER 2 hours! But let me tell you, this is when you know you love to cook. Despite feeling dehydrated, sweaty, disgusting, I loved it! Especially since all that work came out to be successful, which makes EVERYTHING completely worth it!
Go for your passion! It will be worth all the trouble and all the hardships you deal with in order to get to where you want to be. Because when you get there, you will feel pretty good.


Today I made French Onion Soup! Holler! And this time I didn't fail! So I felt very good about myself today. I was sweating up a storm, standing in front of the stove for over 2 hours watching my onions caramelize at a snail-like pace as those around me seemed to finish in no time. But the waiting paid off! Chef said the flavor, the color, and everything was there! Success! It's actually pretty easy to make. I worked on this while my other group members maid some kind of caramel custard, which I failed to produce a picture of because I ate it all beforehand...not surprising, I know, in addition to some Parmesan Rosemary Dinner Rolls, which were fantastic by the way. But since I made the French Onion Soup, might as well share the wealth of knowledge. ( I didnt measure anything out, I just used my best judgment. Measuring is such a pain!)

FRENCH ONION SOUP (Jean's atypical recipe guide)

1. Onion, thinly sliced (Remember it cooks down a lot. I used 3 onions for about 4-5 small servings)
2. Put the onion in a pot with enough butter to coat all the onions. Put the pot on the stove over low heat.
3. Add a little bit of thyme and a bay leaf if you have one at hand.
   
4. Stir occasionally. It takes FOREVER for the onions to cook down and then to actually start caramelizing. Patience is key here, which I really lack!
5. As the onions start to cook down you will notice the product start to look a little oily (from the fat of the butter or whatever you used as the fat portion). Fear not! Once the onions start to caramelize and brown, and you still notice there is excess fat, add a little flour to absorb the fat.
6. Add some beef broth to deglaze the pot, reduce to au sec (almost dry.)
7. Continue adding beef broth a little by little and reduce. This enhances the flavor and also gives it a nice brown color.
8. Add your seasonings (S&P, Thyme). Add some sherry, a splash or two or three (depending on how much of an alcoholic you are). Then add some chicken broth (almost equaling the amount of the beef broth you have put in total.)
9. Bring to a simmer, until it is the right consistency, taste, etc.
10. If you notice that you have too little onions in proportion to the liquids, then don't put so much liquid into the pot.
    
11. Now you think you're done? Wrong. Put the soup into a bowl (oven proof preferrably. Or try risking it with a regular bowl. It's good to be dangerous). Cut a piece of a bread so that it fits on the top of the bowl, sitting on the soup. Toast it before you set it on top of the soup/soup bowl. Then top the bread with gruyere cheese. If gruyere isn't available substitute equal parts monterey jack and parmesan.
    
12. BROIL IT just enough so the cheese is nicely browned.
    
13. Smell it! Love it! Lust after it! THEN DESTROY IT!