Culinary School – Week Eight – Vegetables, Herbs and Exotic Fruits

Who here watches Iron Chef America? I know that I do… and I am constantly amazed at how creative these chefs are. They are also fairly calm throughout the show and handle the pressure with such grace. Well… let’s just say that I an not quite ready to be on Iron Chef… nope… not even close! I mean I think I am a good chef, and I can be creative… but when you put a time limit on my creativity I start to freak out! And that was exactly how I spent the first 15 minutes of my 90 minute challenge last night in Culinary School.

But lets start at the beginning… we were given every vegetable, fruit, and herb under the sun… well maybe not every single one… but close. We had Aspiration, Cauliflower, Broccoli Rabe, Beets, Brussel Sprouts, Asparagus, Yellow Wax Beans, Watercress, Mushrooms, Arugula, Collard Greens, Kale, Bok Choy, Sour Plums, Bitter Melon (they aren’t kidding with the name), Radished, Swiss Chard, Zucchini, Okra, Eggplant, Colarabi, Parsnips, Celery Root, Artichokes, Basil, Spinach, Dill, Thyme… I mean the list goes on and on and on. It looked like Iron Chef America when I saw the spread at school… but I didn’t think we were having a challenge!Just look at all that produce… heaven! Well… it was heaven at first. Normally at Culinary School we are given the weeks recipes a week beforehand so we have time to review and study what we will do. This week we had nothing… no paper… no notes… just baskets and baskets full of produce. We were all curious about what recipes we were going to be doing with all this beautiful food and then the bomb dropped… we had to create a plate with an assigned protein and a side dish using 2 of the vegetables, fruits or herbs in 90 minutes. Not only that but we had to use some sort of stock or mother sauce or variation of a mother sauce.

My mood quickly went from cheerful to full on panic when I was assigned Trout and had to create a dish around it. I am fairly confident that I ran around the room like an idiot for the first 15 minutes trying to figure out what the heck I was going to cook. What kind of seasoning did I want on the trout, what veggies should I use, what should my side dishes be… OMG! If it had been Halibut, Chicken, Beef, Shrimp, Salmon, Sole I would have felt better… but Trout! I don’t have trout ever!

So after my first 15 minutes of complete panic (and finding my favorite white platter and hiding it for presentation) I buckled down and decided on Trout pan friend in olive oil with tons of parsley, a mushroom risotto with every kind of mushroom ever created and a few colorful carrots to bring some color to the dish. I was fairly satisfied with what my final dish included… however I am a planner… I make to-do lists like its my job… and if I had just been given a little more warning I would have probably done a few things differently. Regardless here it is…
It got a pretty good review from Chef… my Trout was cooked perfectly but could have used a tad more salt… my carrots were pretty but they hid the main part of the dish (Trout) and my Mushroom Risotto was perfect – which made me so happy because as you all know I am obsessed with Risotto!

Also, I wanted to share with you a few of my favorite dishes of the night from my fellow classmates. (It was a hard night to take pictures so I wasn’t able to photograph all my favorite dishes 🙁 so sad – But another favorite was Gails… stuffed Chicken with Basil – yummmmm)

This fabulous dish is from Kaymie and it is Grilled Shrimp with a Coconut Sauce and fruit puree. Super delicious and so colorful!
This dish was from David… who literally kept me sane throughout the whole night and remained calm when someone sabotaged his sauce reduction… well we don’t know if it was sabotage… but let’s just pretend for the effect 🙂 It is a New York Strip Steak served atop Celery Root puree, with mini roasted potatoes with savory topped with a beat chip.
All in all it was a good night. I walked out of the school more confident in my knowledge of recipes and with a tub of leftover mushroom risotto. You know what I will be eating for lunch for the rest of the week!