23/05/2012

Wow, it has been nearly 10 months since I wrote on my blog (shame) but at least now I feel like there is something to write about...

The last 10 months have been an exciting journey, I still love my job, had a scare with my heart/brain (still haven't found out what caused that one) and passed my 1st year of being a chef... That's right I am now a 2nd Yr Apprentice...

So lets talk about this year so far, my year didn't really get that exciting till about March so i'll start there.

For my birthday in April my partner (Craig) got me a little puppy (he got her at the end of march though), she is the cutest little munchkin he got her at 9wks old and she was a little shy and frightened when i returned home from TAFE to her hanging out in my kitchen, the previous owners called her 'Spotlight' but after trying to think of a new name for a couple of hours I gave up and didn't think she would get a better one, so I packed her into my car and took her to Vicky's to show off my new birthday present and because I couldn't bear calling her 'Spotlight' I told the kids to call her 'Puppy' but Chelsea's version of 'Puppy' was 'Poppy' and the name stuck, so here is little 'Poppy'

Isn't she just adorable :) she is a Chihuahua cross Australian Silky Terrier

So away from Poppy cause I could talk about her forever I love her so much :)

I have started my 2nd Year at TAFE now and it has been super fun, I've met lots of cool friends and learnt some awesome things... This week we finished up our Hot & Cold Desserts section and I got to make some Chocolate Garnishes (filigree & chocolate cups) which was super fun but messy, we also made some spun sugar which was exciting, and a very very rich chocolate mousse. Here is the finished product of my dessert including a raspberry coulis and some toffee and a few spins of spun sugar (designed and decorated myself)

I made the chocolate cup, plate underneath it and the chocolate circle garnish... looks good aye :)

These are some sticky date puddings I made a few weeks ago as well, they have a butterscotch sauce and praline ice-cream and feathered sauce and cream

And finally some Orange Bavarois (which is a creme anglaise (custard) with an orange jelly on top) just garnished with some strawberries and a few chocolate halves.

Next week starts the 6 week course of Pastries, Cakes and Yeast Goods and by the look of the practical lesson plan, it is going to make me VERY fat :) at least we do the dietary course the 3 weeks after so should be able to lose alot of weight from that haha :)

Till next time

xx

SLACK!!!

Hey,

   I know I have been very slack in writing lately but truth is I just can't find the time, every night when I finish work I'm exhausted and need sleep and my days off are extremely busy so I just can write on here.

Lately everything is going well, I am nearly finished my 1st year as an apprentice and I am super excited about that, I have learnt a ton of new things, and have started to fill out my recipe book I purchased with all the different things I'm learning.

I am going to write off subject now and tell you about my weekend with Mr and Mrs Bodetti.

On Saturday (30th July) I had a wedding to go to, one of Craig's younger cousins was getting married and she invited us to attend, so on Saturday morning we got out of bed rushed around like chickens with no heads and got the car packed up and ventured up to Ipswich.

We checked into our hotel (the same one as the reception) and I took my 2 hours to get my hair and makeup looking good and getting dressed all while Craig was watching the footy on TV. about 10 minutes before we had to leave he jumps up puts his suit on then takes 20mins fixing it to look good... I thought only girls worried about that... when he was half satisfied we drove the 25kms to the wedding chapel in Marburg, it was just a small chapel but set in a huge estate and it was beautiful.

When we walked into the chapel there was a lovely harpist playing music and it sounded so awesome!!! she was definitely better than any string quartet would be, then the ceremony started.

Jenny (bridesmaid) came in a looked beautiful in a stunning silver dress with pleating on a diagonal down the torso, then Laura and her mum (Karen) came through the doors. Karen looked beautiful in her outfit and Laura's dress was amazing. it was a beaded bodice with a wrapover effect and had a small train on the end of it.

After the ceremony, the photos outside were all taken, when the time came for the brides family Laura (bride) called out for her family to come over and she said Craig and Toni... I have never been in a photo at a wedding before so I felt extremely happy to be classed as family :)
When we were standing waiting for all the photos to be taken we looked on the ground below our feet and Craig spotted a snake skin... ewww and a few cane toads jumping around... double ewwww.

We had to venture to the mansion on the estate for photos to be taken and to blow bubbles, it was such a beautiful day and better that everything went without troubles (except for a small tear in the brides gown).

Then it was off to the reception, which was back at the hotel we were staying at. The reception was supposed to start at 5pm but we didn't go into the room until 6pm so everyone was sitting around the bar waiting.

We went into the room after checking our table plan, and found we were sitting on the brides family table up the front. the layout was beautiful, our meals arrived shortly after sitting down and as an entree i had Wild Mushroom & English ricotta risotto and Craig had Prawns & Salmon with a avocado Salsa. the way it worked was everyone at the table got one thing and the person beside you got something different and you could swap if you need to, the downfall for the entree was the rice was still RAW! I still nibbled on it though, Craig didn't touch his salmon said he couldn't eat raw salmon.
Main meals came out next and I had Chicken wrapped in Prosciutto with a bacon and eschallot cream and Craig had Rib Fillet Steak with a mushroom and green peppercorn jus. He devoured his, i couldn't eat all mine as one half of the chicken wasn't cooked and extremely pink! i did not want to be sick last night so i left it.

Then desserts came out and Craig had a Pavlova nest with Chantilly cream and berries with a berry coulis and I had the same, Craig's stepdad had a caramel cheesecake with warm chocolate sauce but i thought it would be too rich for me. the Pavlova was very yummy.

Then came the speeches. they were extremely funny with talks about childhood and when they first met. then the first dance, where everyone was asked to join in as soon as possible. then everyone just sort of floated around talking to each other.

Laura came up to us during the night and said that our room was being put on their wedding package so it was free! it was a shock but she said someone who was going to stay ended up deciding not to, so they put our account onto the package after we had said our goodbyes to Collen (Craig's mum) Laurie (Craig's stepdad) Karen (brides mum) Maverick (brides brother) and Tabitha (brides sister) as they were heading back home for the night, When we went back into the room we got a beer each and just watched this couple make a fool of themselves on the dance floor. The lady of the couple came up and complemented my outfit before sitting down and having a chinwag with me for a while.

Then after a while we retreated to the bedroom where my feet started loving me for taking my heels off and putting some soft socks on :) oh and did I mention we had a king size bed... it was MASSIVE! felt like I was sleeping in my own bed :)

It was such a wonderful day, and I thank Laura and Peter for letting us share this memory with them, and I wish them all the best for their trip to Zambia for their honeymoon

My First Day at TAFE

Hey Guys,

   Well today was AWESOME!!! I had so much fun and learnt soooo many things today. To start with I will tell you a bit about it. I arrived at TAFE and it was raining and cold, when I arrived into the classroom there were only 3 other students!! My classes will all be small, we started straight away by prepping onions, carrots and celery to do precision cuts, we learnt to do Julienne,  Brunoise, Paysanne, Jardiniere, Macedoine, Battons and cubes, it was so much fun after those 3 veg we through in a few leeks and potatoes then vacum packed them to use in our soups when the time comes to make them it was so exciting, we also made a Tomato Concasse and Mushroom Duxelle, After that we went on a 15 minute break.

When we came back we learnt about cutting meats, before learning to cut different sized sirloin we had to weigh up the yield (lost fat, grissle) to see how much our 4kg sirloin really was (this is more an exercise focusing on portion control and why restaurants by the steaks already cut) after cutting away the Shane (overflap) and cutting away all the fat and grissle, we lost just on 1.5kg so if as a restaurant we purchased a whole cut at $20 a kg we would be throwing away $30 worth of unusable stock, it was such an eye opening experience to see that.

After that we deboned a whole chicken, one of the girls in the class was so squeamish i asked her is she was a vegetarian, she informed me she wasn't but like the idea of not knowing too much about what she eats (clearly she is in the wrong career), after we had finished all that it was time for our 45minute lunch break, by this stage we were already 2/3 of the way through the class.

When we all returned we had set up a table for the 4 of us to use together, due to the fact the teacher was only supposed to have 3 students in the class but another student showed up, so this practical meant the teacher needed to show us all what to do with our meat because he didnt have one to show us with. We filleted and skinned fish next, we started with some flatfish (sole) i have to tell you, i have never in my life filleted or skinned a fish! but i aced it, then we filleted some snapper.

We made some bechamel sauce, mayonaisse from scratch then turned it into Tartare.

It was extremely fun with heaps more to do tomorrow...

TAFE ORIENTATION

Hey Guys,

   So I went in for my TAFE orientation today (for those that are in NZ, TAFE is like Polytech) it was a 9-1 class, I show up and search for what seems like forever just to find out where I am supposed to be, finally I found my class room D512, door locked no body inside, when the clock rolled around to 9:15 I rung the administration to find out if I was in fact at the right place, she asked me to come down to admin (room 512 is 5th floor room 12) when I got down to Admin they informed me the teacher didn't know there was a class on and would be up waiting for me by the time I got back to the class. So I go to the 5th floor again and wait outside the class, a few minutes later a group of students come past with a teacher saying "In this room guys" I thought it would be my class but didn't follow, I heard as the teacher started talking they were 3rd year students, a lady then walked out of the kitchen and informed me she was the teacher and I was the only student doing orientation today :)

Seeing as it was only me she decided she would make us a coffee in the kitchen and I was soon standing with 5 teachers drinking coffee, they all made me feel like I was one of them which was nice, they just talked about classes and I must have looked like a bit of an idiot just standing there. After a while another teacher Allan joined us, now the TAFE only has 7 chefs as teachers and I was drinking coffee now with 6 of them, the other teacher who signed me up to TAFE was teaching some students.

Chef Allan was going to do my orientation today as Chef Elizabeth had to go and sign up a new apprentice seeing as she didn't know there was a class today.

We went into class 512 and started going over a few things I would need to know about the course and TAFE, like they have 4 shrinks that are apparently good and a hair and beauty salon 3 floors down who are very cheap, we then went to the office so I could get my student ID and my Class Timetable, I also had to fill out a literacy and numeracy test. He sent me on a 30min break while he went chasing some more paperwork that we needed to go over. when I got back it was time to trial my online student centre, where I could do all my theory work online if I wish or in the old style exam booklets. I logged on and we found that although I was enrolled in 26 units I could only access 1. (the system only went online TODAY) so I was given Allan's email address and told to contact him everytime I couldn't get into the courses.

I was also given 5 workbooks to see if the online and the text book form were the same and all up finished TAFE at 2pm, an hour over the time I was supposed to, but i still get paid till the time i finish. It is such an amazing feeling knowing I am doing something with my life now. During my 30 min break they had a band from the music centre playing in the outside bistro for the students, everyone was super friendly and it is going to be an experience that I will enjoy.

BTW. The Kitchen at TAFE is HUGE!!!! They have 3 kitchens all joined together in one area that connects to a restaurant, they also have another kitchen to service the canteen/bistro area and another kitchen to service private functions, which isn't used at any other time.

I am going to have an awesome time at TAFE and I start at 8am-5:15pm on 18/4/11

Bye for Now!

Tuesday 8th March 2011

Okay Okay... so I am very very slack!!!

Since the last time i wrote on my blog i have had quite a few things happen, I will sum it up for you...

I've had days where I drop everything I touch
Days when I burn everything I cook (quite a few of these)
Burns all over my arms and hands, fingers hurt the most
And days where I've cut nearly every inch of my hands, especially the very nasty deep cup I have on the side of my hand, that hurt like hell and is still healing, oh that happened the day after my last post :)

But out of all the days I have had, TODAY has been the most exciting... why you ask... well today I officially became a TAFE student, that's right I am a student now, school diary, paperwork, homework the whole thing, oh and also the handy Student Discounts hehe... I'll start from the beginning of today...

I showed up at work at 9:30 today and the head chef at Ashmore Campus TAFE was there to greet me and sit down with me to chat for about 1 hour that turned into 1.5 hours, we talked about everything to do with TAFE the location of my classes when my classes are, student rules and information, I even got to choose which 3 electives I would like to do, I chose

Plan and Prepare Food for Buffet
Make Presentations
Prepare Pates and Terrines

I also have 26 core subjects which are;

Apply First Aid
Organise and Prepare Food
Present Food
Receive and Store Kitchen Supplies
Clean and Maintain Kitchen Premises
Use Basic Methods of Cookery
Prepare Appetisers and Salads
Prepare Stock, Sauces and Soups
Prepare Vegetables, Fruit, Eggs and Farinaceous Dishes
Select, Prepare and Cook Poultry
Select, Prepare and Cook Seafood
Select, Prepare and Cook Meat
Prepare Hot and Cold Desserts
Prepare Pastries, Cakes and Yeast Goods
Develop Cost-Effective Menus
Prepare, Cook and Serve Food for Food Service
Prepare, Cook and Serve Food for Menus
Prepare Foods According to Dietary and Cultural Needs
Develop and Update Hospitality Industry Knowledge
Work with Colleagues and Customers
Work in a Socially Diverse Environment
Deal with Conflict Situations
Implement Food Safety Procedures
Coach others in job skills
Follow Health, Safety and Security Procedures
Follow Workplace Hygiene Procedures

So this will keep me quite busy for a while, I will be going to TAFE every 3rd Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday with my orientation day being the 4th April and my first day of school being the 18th April. I am so excited about all this and the TAFE head chef was very kind.

Oh and he gave me homework and I haven't really started yet, its a heads up thing, I go to a class on the 23rd May about Foundation Subjects to do with Kitchen Hygiene and Safety and instead of learning it all on the day I am learning it now and then when the day comes I know everything and just listen and answer questions and take the test.

Well I am heading off to have some tea now, STARVING!!

Will post again soon when something happens

Wednesday 16/02/2011

I know I have been very slack lately and i do apologise to everyone that reads my blog, there is no excuse except for well working in a bistro you tend to do the same thing every week, I am therefore deciding that until I start my TAFE course I will be updating on days where something really good happens or weekly.
I'm sorry but there just isn't enough time in the day and I get home from work and practically fall into bed and sleep I am that exhausted, so I will give you a weekly update.

On Tuesday 8th, I had a pretty normal sort of day doing alot of chicken and veal prep, I also had to cut up 3 containers of tomato slices, now I don't know if anyone has seen my hand cut tomato slices but lets just say I used alot of tomatoes to fill 3 x 750ml containers I suck at doing it but I will only get better as I go on. Lunch today was pretty quiet we done 46 dishes and had everything ready for the dinner trade which was a bonus. When I arrived back for the dinner trade we got told that a lady has shown up about the booking of 20 people she made... there was no booking... so we got absolutely smashed not just from her booking but the other 73 people that decided to come in as well, we got everything done though and got out only 30 minutes late which is really good.

On Wednesday 9th, I learnt today how to remove the chargrill and clean it completely which takes alot of elbow grease. with there being 3 of us working today I stuck out the back and done a heap of prep and cleaning, I made some salad dressing, which is mayo & french dressing mixed together very tangy and helped make some pepper sauce, and by help I mean watched as Adam made it :) I also scored myself 3 burns which hurt like hell especially when they decided to pop a few days ago, but Grandad was super nice and gave me an aloe vera stalk and some finger bandages when I went there on my break, oh and Nanna heated me up some curried sausages and gave me some bread too.. I felt very spoilt for a few hours. Then off to work I went again, it got to a point when I didn't think customers would stop coming in but they did and I was working the dishwasher non stop from 6:30-8:45, the waitress dropped a plate too at my feet so at least that was one less to clean up. we served 124 people over dinner. ALOT AYE!!!

On Thursday I had the day off but I had to go into work to see the Mission Australia lady who was to set me up for the apprenticeship, we had a good talk about the sort of things I will be doing, that the government will pay me $800 at 3 months into the apprenticeship for tools and that overall I will get $5500 from them by the time I finish my apprenticeship, she also said that seeing as I will be going to Ashmore Campus TAFE I will be able to mix with alot of other first years and she wouldn't be surprised if I didn't have a new employer sometime throughout it all, she had just been for another hotel signing up a guy to his 5th employer, apparently the students all talk about a little thing called 'hourly wage' and they all scramble to the place that pays the most. I won't though I am very loyal to my company now, I love everyone there and they all make me feel like I have been there forever

On Sunday I made 40 beef and onion pies, they are called 'Grazier's Beef Pies' and they looked absolutely awesome, fair enough the meat mixture was already pre packaged and they pastry shells were already made up but I filled them all, brushed and sealed the lids and cooked them so technically I made them, right. I also made Pepper Sauce from scratch by myself as well as Mushroom Sauce, it is pretty simple they have an ingredients list and you just follow it. I also found out that Ceaser Dressing has ANCHOVIES in it YUCK!! but being a chef I have to forget about that, so now whenever I have ceaser dressing I most likely will not finish it just the thought of fish in a sauce is quite disgusting, which is worse when it is your favourite salad dressing in the world :(

On Monday I done prep up to make salads, we didn't make any but everything was ready for them to be made the next morning, being valentines day we had a special menu on the board, it was Seafood Marinara Fettuccine, which had all sorts of seafood (scollops, baby octopus, squid, barramundi, crab) it looked quite CHUNKY. There was also Steak with Lobster Tail with mash, and Asian Beef ribs with rice. sooo many people wanted the seafood one, no-one got the lobster but for $40 I don't blame them, I also got to serve all day today while Danny was out the back doing prep and dishes, it was quite full on.

Well that is all from me for now, I will keep posting on my days off so until then...

Sunday 06/01/2011

At the start of today I found out where the laundry room is, we have a cleaner come in during the week to clean the place and do the motel rooms but today was her day off so I needed to know where the room was so I could clean the dishcloths and tea towels when they needed to be done, it is such a maze too. You have to go through 6 doors just to get to the washing machine and they are all locked with different keys. it took me a while when I went back to hang the towels out to get the right key, but it still only took me 10 minutes to get it all done.

After i had done that mission it was my job to cut up the roast for the day, it really hurts your arm cutting up sooo much meat and I have been told that eventually I will have massive muscles in just one arm from all this work I do. I also had to make up all the sauces, Smokey BBQ, Salad Dressing, Tartare and Bourbon Ribs. they have a book that gives you all the ingredients and we just make about 10 ltrs of it. I also cut up Parsley which is really easy cause they have a machine to cut it you just wrap it in a dishcloth and rinse all the green juice out of it.

During lunch it was busy with everyone coming in for the Sunday Roast so we had our hands full, but it was still really fun.

During my break today I had to race to Cascade Gardens for Chelsea's 1st birthday party, I was a VIP today because I had the CAKE, no-one but Vicky, Craig and myself had seen it so it was very good to see all the happy faces when they seen how much work we done with it.

When I arrived back at work, I made up 80 salads for tomorrow, cut up carrots and broccoli, and cut pumpkin and potatoes to cook.

Dinner tonight was very spread out and a bit quiet so Danny done all the meals himself while I done all the prep and cleaned the store down. it was a very easy night, and I am not as tired as every other night.

I also tried a drink today that the barman gave me, its orange juice and lift. it was very yummy and refreshing sort of like a solo but less tang.

Well I am off to make a lovely desert, pavlova minis with raspberries and strawberries with cream and dusted with icing sugar YUMMMMM.