An update and a Rant

April 12- 23, 2010
Okay so I haven’t updated in such a long while (almost 2 weeks) but let’s just say that it’s been really busy past two weeks. I’ve been volunteering almost every Saturday for the past 3 weeks already. Let’s see there was crabfest that I reported on last week, the Wellspring Church Fundraiser Event (which was a success), and this upcoming week is the Hawaii Kai Chilie Cook-off, which will be hosting a lot of different restaurants. So I’m going to be on my best behavior (which I am…mostly). Another thing that has happened in the past week was that registration for the Fall semester at KCC has opened up. So I signed up for CULN 207: Principles of Culinary Competition I (which I’m excited and so nervous for) and CULN 240 Garde Manger (which I’m stoked about because it’s going to be a lot of knife skills and food carving….can you say awesome?).
Competition or competing in culinary competitions in general, has become a goal of mine ever since the KCC competition team won the National Title and I read the book The Knives at Dawn (which was an interesting and worth-while read). It made me want to compete in smaller or closer to home competitions (like the Annual Roy’s Competition or the annual Pamela Young Competition). The only thing that is holding me back, other than my lack of discipline in my skills, is that I’m not too confident in myself. I mean I have the drive and when I get addicted to something I’m almost dedicated to it….but I don’t know. This is when the doubts start to set in. This is when those pesky “what-if” scenarios pop in my head. Taking this class, making the team or not, will benefit me huge. I mean the things that I’ll take from this will be way more. I think I just need to concentrate and focus all my energy in bettering my skills and attitude towards my craft.
Okay so on Saturday April 17, 2010 a handful use from the 818 brigade (a name that my classmate Mark likes to call our class section of Fundamentals of Cookery) volunteered to cater Mark and Gina’s church’s fundraiser. The menu was created by Mark and planned on feeding about 300 people. There were 5 different dishes:

Picture are taken by Jordan Chang, Mark Enomoto, and Your's truly
The Menu
Iceberg Wedge with a chunky Blue Cheese Dressing and Parmesan Crisp
Chilled Spring Pea Veloute Soup with a mint whip and carrots Vichy
Ratatouille served on Fried Creamy Polenta
Classic Boeuf Bourguignon with Homemade Mash Potatoes
And
Vanilla Almond Strawberry-Shortcake with Grand Manier Drunken Strawberries garnished with a lemon crumble and piped whipped cream
We started out day out at Radford High School’s kitchen at 7:00AM and just immediately got to work. There was the sounds of vegetables being cut, beef being broken down (150lbs….that’s like almost an entire cow…..can you say Holy “Cow”?...hehe), vegetables being seared, sauces sizzling, blenders blending, a radio loud enough to be heard in the background, and finally the calls of “hot pan” or “Yes chef”. Finally at around 4:30 we were ready to pack it all up and rush on over to the church location to start platting food. Unfortunately for me I took a wrong turn and ended up going all the way up the H3 from Aiea to Kaneohe (for those who don’t live on the island is a hell of a drive….Literally over the mountain and back down) and had to follow it up till I could turn around. Then I’d race it down (almost going 70mph in a 50mph zone… I know but we were so late already).
By the time we got there Mark (who went ahead) was set up and was about to start serving. Once the opening ceremony was done like a cattle call, a hoard of people came up to our elegant station and started scooping up plates of food left and right. But fortunately for us we had helpers to help plate and assist in the flow of food. (YAY!!!) Each of us was stationed at a specific area. Me I was stationed at the end and was in charge of plating the dessert. By the end of the event we ended with a hefty amount of leftovers that the brigade and most of the volunteers could take home. Me I took home some of everything. Overall it was an interesting and exciting experience. I think making massive amounts of food in CULN 130 for the cafeteria paid off. It was interesting because each of us were in part in charge of our own dishes and there wasn’t really a chef de cuisine. In a way we were all in charge. Totally different than what I did for KCC’s Hookipa Event (a fundraiser event for KCC held annually at the Royal Hawaiian where each culinary class makes something different…where we had to make 500 portions of about 5 different petite fours). For the hookipa event we were all under the tutelage and supervision of our chef instructor. Which was why is was a little different. But overall everything went well we all had fun.

As for class nothing has been any different. This week we were on entrée and the week prior we were on salads. While we were on salad station I found that I’m pretty good at making vinaigrettes. I actually enjoyed making salads more than any of the other stations. Let’s see I made a peanut butter sweet chili tofu salad and a hoisin vinaigrette tofu salad, I created my own BSP (bacon, spinach and tomato) salad with a tomato caper vinaigrette, and created both a lime and a lemon citrus vinaigrette. (can you tell that I really liked making vinaigrettes?) For entrée station we were responsible for making the various entrees served in the cafeteria. It’s always a meat, fish, and a vegetarian dish. For my vegetarian dish I made butternut squash gnocchi. It turned out pretty well the only thing I would’ve changed would be to roast the butternut squash whole rasher than cut up so that way it would roast evener. Then Casey did egg plant parmesan for his vegetarian dish. Boy was there a lot of eggplant. Almost 5 full sheet tray. But the week progressed and we had to start finishing up our practical exam items, which was a soup, salad, entrée, and vegetable cuts. I finished my salad and vegetable cuts getting good scores on them granted I thought I could do better. Now I only have my entrée and soup to tackle. Since today was Friday we have a lot of free time and decided to run a sort of iron chef competition among our class. So the rules are simple. We’d get a mystery ingredient and we’d have to make something out of it. Today I participated and our secret ingredient was parsnips. The dreaded vegetable that’s almost like a potato and a carrot, but it’s not, and that has a sweet taste. Gahhh….as I started my plan was to make a puree and lay some asparagus and some kind of protein on top. I succeeded in doing that but it just didn’t come together all too well. I think I assed too much liquid to my boiled parsnips that turned it to an almost applesauce like consistency. One big mistake I made was using beef base rather than beef stock as my liquid to thin out my puree. (HUGE MISTAKE…..IT TURNED IT A DARK SHADE!!!!!) Seeing as I didn’t have time to correct it I went with it and continued on with my initial platting plan. Eventually everything went well and the puree held up until the end where it just collapsed and turned into a kind of puddle. I was so heartbroken and discouraged I was ready to give up already. Knowing I couldn’t do anything to fix it in the time remaining I went with it. After chef judged out dishes I placed 3rd out or 4 (which was better than I anticipated). I totally overcooked the protein, but in my defense I really hate cooking chicken because for me it’s hard to tell when it’s done so I just guessed and went by touch. In the end it was something new and it was exciting. Basically this was a crash course into using a new ingredient, which was interesting because I’ve never done anything like this before. I just wish that KCC had courses like this where you’re given a certain ingredient each day and you had to make a dish out of it. I think that would be an interesting class that everyone wouldn’t mind taking.

April 5- April 9

This week we were on short order station, an actual station where you can interact with people rather than being stuck “behind the scenes” making soup or something (not saying that it isn’t bad). Over the past week my group and I run different specials that we sell from around 10AM to about 1PM or until we run out of a certain special (which only happened once towards the end of the week…boo). The week of the fifth to the ninth we ran specials like to order sautéed swordfish with a fruit salsa (made by ours truly) or a sweet and sour sauce, Loco Moco’s (A bed of rice topped with a hamburger patty topped with an egg of your choice and “drenched” in gravy… or would “drowned” be a better word?), Open face turkey sandwiches with homemade cranberries, and a ton of Teriyaki chicken plates. As the week progressed and we came along some bumps in the road; like the fish fillets were taking just way too long to cook and running out of the teriyaki chicken for the plates. It was a sort of a scramble but we got through it.
With all the people that have been short order no one has ever made a dessert or a sweet short order dish yet. It has all been just savory items. This week I wanted to try making fried ice cream or crepes to order and with the encouragement from our leading chef, Chef Eric, I was determined to get a least something out. (Which didn’t really happen….stumble and an EPIC FAIL). In the end it was way too late to make anything because the ice cream had to be ordered the week before since frozen items like that only come in on Mondays and if I were to make crepes I’d have to demonstrate how to many I could make in a short amount of time. Plus the idea I had for crepes was pretty out there and had a variety of different components to it. So in the end none of my dessert ideas were used this week.

Not only was this week the week where we could interact with people but it was also a super busy week for me. On top of cooking I had an oral presentation project that I needed to decide on a topic and start studying for an exam that we have next week (which is tomorrow); a volunteer opportunity presented itself. It was the annual crabfest that the Ala Moana Rotary club holds. So Friday (ours slow day) was used as just a day to prep (no real action going on). On that Saturday (the day of the event) we went in guns a blaze and banged everything we need to do that night. At the end of the event we were able to take home a few crabs (which were left over…YAY!!!). The next day I had work at my weekend job so it was a nonstop busy week. Then this upcoming weekend we have another event (granted it’s not a school function) it is a culinary event. We, some of the 818 Brigade, are helping Mark out with the catering for their Churches function. So I’m looking forward to this upcoming week and the experiences that I’m going to take from it. I guess things are looking up. I’m actually cooking more often and reinforcing my confidence in myself and skill set. So it’s time to quit my current job (which is at a movie theater) and find one out in the industry. Wish me Luck.

An Introduction and a Recap

Welcome fellow bloggers! My name is Reid Root. I'm currently a culinary and pastry student at Kapiolani Community College situated on the island of Oahu. Being a culinary student or a student in general there are a ton of things we experience everyday and its all caught up in an emotional whirlwind just waiting to burst. That being said the reason behind creating this blog was sort of a way for me to express those pent- up thoughts and record my journey; whether it is failures, trials, or successes, through culinary school and life. If you’re reading this you’re either bored and are perusing through blogs, hit the next blog button, are interested in my journey through school and life, or are a supportive friends, family or classmates. Either way thank you and hope you enjoy my blog.


Module One: A quick recap of the first part of the semester
The morning session of Fundamentals of Cookery with Chef Frank Leake, the class that I've heard so many horror stories (all over exaggerated) from some of my pastry classmate, wasn’t all that bad in reality. To be honest it was rather exhilarating having to scramble almost every day to finish things ON TIME and it was relieving express my feeling and reflect upon myself in my daily writings. Slicing my thumb on the right hand ( which is my dominant hand) and having to get TEN stitches from a plastic surgeon (whom I thank for saving me from a rather irritated RN) was a bump in the road (or as my friends call it an EPIC FAIL). Like a player who twisted their ankle I was BENCHED for the next week (to my great dismay). Eventually I healed and got back into cooking and got ready to take on the dragon of all practical exams.
I finished almost everything in the practical exam and was very close in bribing someone to sell me their unused egg so I could make up for a broken mayonnaise. Overall my hard work and persistence to never give up got me through with a passing grade and gave me new confidence in both my skills and myself. After this class was done it was time to move onto a different class. Intermediate Cookery.

Module Two: The first four weeks of the second part of the semester
The beginning was a bit intimidating but now it is almost like going to work. We’re basically in the cafeteria working on different stations every week. The different stations are salad, entrée, short- order, deli, and steward. The first week we alternated daily each station just to get use to each. Then the second week we were assigned groups and given a specific rotation cycle. My group consists of Casey, Andrew, and Kanji. The first two weeks went by well but by the third week I was finally feeling the fatigue and illness that I was afraid of catching earlier in the first module and came down with a nasty cold and missed two days of class.
The four week has come, we’re at short-order, and I’m about 95% recovered. So things are looking up. Basically short-order is a lot of cooking that’s short and fast (hence the name). Today I cooked a massive amount of fries (Straight, curly, and onion rings) for the masses. Tomorrow is a longer day where we get to cook for the waiting hungry students (YES human interaction!!!!) Tomorrow special is Chili cheese dog and Teri- Chicken. I’m thinking about throwing together a last minute barbeque burger with onion rings inside. Let’s see if I can do it and how it pans out ( I mean pretty simple right?)