Culinary Foundations 1

That's what our first course is called. It's a basic introductory class. We will learn basic principles of cooking techniques, history of food service, culinary terminology, standards of professionalism, and organization of working kitchens. The course will also cover chef tools, commercial equipment, basic food science principles and an introduction to the elements of taste and flavor. And finally, we'll get the foundation for Le Cordon Blue stocks, sauces, and soups. Seems like a lot in 6 weeks. It will be super quick that's for sure.

On day 2, I had a short turnaround from the night before. Class starts at 6:00 am, I leave my Mom's at about 5:15 am. I got home from Monday night's class at 10:00 pm then I had two chapters to read and my uniform to iron. When I finally went to bed at 11:45, I dreamt about forgetting my hat and apron at home, and I was not admitted to class over and over again. I was so paranoid about messing something up. Needless to say, I was a bit tired on Tuesday.I also had to take out my nose ring. I was ok with it. I just didn't feel it was worth the trouble of taking out or covering up every day.

In class we covered a good deal of history of the food service industry beginning from the middle ages through the formation and organization of today's culinary arts. History is really one of my favorite subjects so I really enjoyed this part!!! I learned a bunch of cool facts so I decided to add a fun facts section to the blog. As I learn interesting facts I'll add it to the scroll (Thanks Jessica!). My AM Class instrustor is cool and she gets super excited talking about food, it's fun to watch her share her energy, especially so early in the morning.

The second part of class consisted of us getting to get our knives out for the first time. It was so cool. I've never had super good knife skills, in fact, they are horrible. I had no idea that it would actually be pretty easy if you have a good knife. I mean WOW! What a difference. Amazing. We started off with a batonnet cut, a 1/4" square by 2" strip and that is easily converted to a small dice by cutting the strips in 1/4" sections. See picture below.

The different small piles represent my attempts at cuts, that way I can track my progress.