Le Cordon Bleu - Instruction #1

Today started with some more details about the school, the chefs, and the student code of conduct. From what I gathered from the day and a half orientation/introduction is,

Be in uniform,

Be on time,

Don’t miss class.

These points were painfully driven home.
"Hello Le Cordon Bleu - meet Dead Horse."

After the reiteration, it was on to Instruction #1 - finally we’re going to start cooking.

Instruction #1, Welcome to French Cuisine

• Basic principles: techniques, presentation and use of kitchen knives
• Various ways of cutting vegetables

• Rustic vegetable soup

Instructed by Chef Bruno Stril – a serious with a smile type of a guy. Willing to stop and answer any questions that popped up. I can tell that he is going to be kind and gentle with all of us beginners.

For each instruction we are given the list of ingredients. It is our responsibility to take notes and develop the recipe from what we see, hear, taste, and smell. Needless-to-say, I was scrambling around jotting my notes – and we were just making a simple vegetable soup…what will the Rack of lamb with parsley crust, spring vegetables and stuffed tomatoes day be like? Yikes!

With only 3 hours of sleep the night before (I was terrified about be late and not in my uniform – LCB’s scare tactic must have worked), I was absent-minded by the end of the lecture.

I was ready for sleep. But, I changed into my street clothes, gathered my chef’s bag and headed for the grocery store. As you may guess I was making Rustic Vegetable Soup for dinner last night. This gave me an opportunity to get accustomed to the knives, my timing, and of course, the recipe!

This afternoon is my practical class, where I need to replicate the soup for presentation to a chef. Each practical class is graded by the tasting chef. These marks will make up our final grade in conjunction with the written and practical exams.