Crazy.Insane.Love?

(Preface: Crazy.Stupid.Love. is a movie with some genuine soul. For anyone who has not watched it, there is a part of you missing in you that you don't even know about...yet...until after you've watched the movie, by which point the missing part in you will no longer be missing.)

Anyway...

Just for today, I hate potatoes. I peeled, sliced, chopped, mashed and made Dauphinoise potatoes out of maybe five, six, seven kilograms (or more) of potatoes. I have never touched so many potatoes in the span of two hours at any point in my life...not even when I gobbled 13 mini bags of Walkers Cheese and Onion's this past Sunday.

Maybe I should backtrack a little. We had about 70 customers at the restaurant for lunch service today. Four out of the twelve kitcheneers (students who work in the kitchen as oppose to the ones working front-of-house) were absent. We were seriously swamped with orders. Even though most of the orders were pre-orders, giving us ample time to prep for service in advance, service was still quite intense. It was just my chef trainer and I on the veg section during service...and at one point I was plating five different vegetables on 20 dishes at the same time. 

Veg section is a piece of work I tell you. You are everywhere at all times. Mains is probably the hardest section to master but veg is nasty if you can't be at three places simultaneously, which is a skill (despite being small, swift and relatively agile) I have yet to successfully acquire. "The fish dish wants the cavolo nero (now!); the pork belly needs the mashed potatoes (now!) and the chicory (now!) and the carrot (now!); the venison can't be plated...where are the potatoes...not that kind...the other kind of potatoes (now!); where are the anchovy beignets for the gurnards?! Wait...the gurnards need potatoes too...not the first two kinds - the saffron ones...Shirley, that's a little too much cavolo; the fish will drown in it; Shirley, not enough cabbage; it's a side...; okay, let's get the broccoli on there! Where is the cabbage for the ravioli??? [There is cabbage for the ravioli?! O.o Right! More cavolo nero...] Someone clean this plate!"  You get the picture. Okay, now picture it again, but this time, the kitchen is so heated up by this point that you can do some deep vinyasa flows and hot hatha poses and get a real good detoxifying sweat out of it. What a crazy, crazy day!

Yet, it was my best kitchen day so far. I must be certifiably insane. I am quite burnt out right now but in reflection, I learnt what I never would have on a slow day. I took on some responsibilities today that last week, a month ago or at the beginning of the semester, I would not have thought I could handle. I realise that I love the pressure, the quick pace and the activeness of it all. Don't get me wrong: I still want to bake overly-elaborate, indulgent cakes for rich people but being thrown into the deep end head-first onto a section I had not really prepared for got the stubborn fight in me going. 

Now I am just waiting for the happy, energy crash. zzzZZZzzzzzzzZZzZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzz......but only after I finish this other blog for ICT...

Quick Meals #3

Another quick-meal-random-mashup. :) 

Part One: Mushroom tortellini (pre-fab ones) tossed in cream of chicken and mushroom soup (from the can), with fresh tomatoes, diced onions, white button mushrooms, seasoning and grated Parmesan cheese. 

Part Two: Marinated pork chops. I honestly don't quite recall which spices I used. Looking at the picture there must have been fresh black pepper, dried rosemary and fresh parsley (snip, snip). Knowing me I probably also added a pinch of salt, brown sugar and olive oil. Popped them straight into the oven at 200°C until juices ran clear and glazed with honey at the end. 

(http://sd.keepcalm-o-matic.co.uk/i/it-s-gonna-be-legen-wait-for-it-dary.png)

The chops were tasty fresh out of the oven but they were legen-wait-for-it-dary at 2:48am in the morning. O.o

Final Verdict: You can't go wrong with pork chops and a white sauce.

First Harvest + Quick Meals #2

Phew. I managed to save my parsley plant. Despite its colour being slightly yellowish—at least it's still alive—I strategically pruned it and got my first parsley harvest today. It's quite hard to ignore the aroma of freshly cut parsley so, of course, I had to use some right away. 




Dinner: Baked Salmon with Miscellaneous Sauce (elaborated below) topped with fresh chopped parsley and served with a simple tomato and cucumber salad with lots of feta (mmmm!!mmm) and balsamic vinegar. I have been eating A LOT of this salad; it's just so easy and quick to make. Most importantly, it's cheap. Student Cooking 101: It's all about convenience, speed and budget. As you can see in the photo, I did not even bother discarding the parsley stems. The more the merrier.

Right, the Miscellaneous Sauce. 

Ingredients in Miscellaneous Sauce (a.k.a. a mixture of random things I found in my fridge...):
-Ketchup, Thai Sweet Chilli Sauce, Salad Cream (in equal quantity, I put about one tablespoon each)
-Spring Onions (chopped)
-Ginger (diced)
-Garlic (finely diced)
-Olive Oil

Surprisingly, it was really tasty. I think it's the ketchup; ketchup makes everything taste better. I also seasoned the fish with freshly ground black pepper and chinese five spice before loading the sauce onto the fillets. I think, in post-rationalisation, I was going for an Asian Fusion type thing?! 

I finished the dish with a sprinkle of dried parsley. 

Not Too Long After...

My parsley plant! :S Apparently one of the many things that "melt" in heat.
This is the reason why I should never have children... (kidding?)
Or why you can't leave young things unattended in a small room... 

A Little Bit of Green

New additions to my room - Sweet Basil and Flat-Leaf Parsley

Quick Meals #1

From a few weeks back: Dukboki...with British sausages and sliced cabbage :D

Cheers!

First post from the other side of the Atlantic! Wooh :)

People say 'Cheers!' all the time in the UK. I've slowly picked it up after living here for two months. The phrase is quite encompassing in meaning, ranging from hello to goodbye to hey to hi to thank you to you're welcome and of course, you say it when you're having drinks with friends. Despite having rationally accepted that it's just a phrase, I still find it awkward to say; especially if I'm not all that cheery at the moment, I feel as if I'm telling a lie. Besides, it sounds weird with a non-British accent. So for the time being, my Canadian thank-you's and friendly how-are-you's will suffice.

Quick recap: As part of my course, I am working in the kitchen once a week at my university's restaurant for Semester 1. Cleaning raw chicken livers is the most animated and adventurous activity I have undertaken so far. It wasn't the most glamorous task but it had to be done. We are preparing partridges for November's menu so there will definitely be a post about the tiny birds. Our chef trainer showed us one today; there is hardly any meat on them. They should be quite similar in taste and texture as the roast pigeons you get in Chinese restaurants.

(Random insertion:"...and a partridge in a pear tree...and a peaar"- they are pretty much the same size!) 

There has also been more cooking at home/residence. Groceries, especially fresh meats, are costly in Oxford. I'm having a hard time finding a decent slice of steak. I have turned (unwillingly) into a semi-vegetarian, meaning that I have roughly - very rough, the magnitude of the situation's gravity has probably been exponentially and falsely multiplied in my mind - been eating half the meat I am used to back home. Another dish that I dearly crave is steamed fish. I miss seeing live fish swim in overcrowded tanks. On top of it, I lack all my baking equipment. I have these frequent urges to bake and I don't even own a muffin tin. It actually makes me quite depressed.

Coming up: There will be some posts with photos of the budget-friendly meals I've been dishing up. I also have some challenges in mind. The macarons challenge is unfortunately indefinitely put on hold (due to lack of kitchen supplies). The caramel challenge, however, is definitely doable. Hopefully a few challenges will fully materialise within the next couple of weeks...

Here We Go Again.

It's been an eventful 2011 for personal investment, daydreaming, growth and path-finding. I learnt a lot about myself and took a break from blogging about my private affairs all together (from both in and out of the kitchen and around the world). But as the title of this blog indicates, this is a life-long project and I'm starting to feel that itch to burn something in the kitchen on a regular basis again...in a good way (ready, Caramel?). That and the fact I'm planning to do some permanent relocation to another part of the globe in the not too far nor distant future and needless to elaborate, those experiences must be recorded...along with all the delicious foods and drinks that I will consume, chow and chug down along the way. More on that later; I've been keeping my fingers figuratively crossed in my head for the past couple of months.

There are a couple of on-going challenges that I've thought of: wine, smelly cheeses, caramel and, of course, the macarons. (I have not forgotten those devilishly delicious yet ridiculously difficult-to-make confections; they've plagued and been nagging at my sub-conscience for many months now.)

Okay, so one cinder block at a time. I'm sure some famous person said something inspirational at some point about standing up from where you fell and picking up something along the way. With that spirit in mind, the next chapter of this journey shall begin with, yup you guessed it, macarons*. 
*Note: WITH FEET, very very important.

Goal:


P.S. "Whenever you fall, pick up something." That's the quote, by Oswald Theodore Avery. Thanks Google.
P.P.S. Hey, I actually did end up prepping sea urchins in my own kitchen. :D