Week 6: Potato, Patata, starches and grains.

This week we learned everything we needed to learn about potatoes and starches! This vegetable is one of the most important guest in our kitchen, there are thousands of recipes in where Potatoes are more than welcome. 

Besides its enormous nutritional value, the potatoes are cheap, the amount of nutrients in a potato is so high that is one of the most complete meals there are. 

Potatoes originated in South America, most historians attribute it to Peru, even tho, by the time Europeans arrived to the New World, Potatoes could be easily found throughout the Americas, from The United States to Uruguay. Throughout Europe, the  most important new food in the 19th century was the potato, which had three major advantages over foods for the consumer: its lower rate of spoilage, its bulk (which easily satisfied hunger), and its cheapness. The crop slowly spread across Europe, such that, for example, by 1845 it occupied one-third of Irish arable land. 

I'm pretty sure you all have heard of the Great Irish Potato Famine, a lack of genetic diversity from the low number of varieties left the crop vulnerable to disease, in 1845, a plant disease known as late blight, caused by the fungus-lke oomycete Phytophthora infestans spread rapidly through the poorer communities of western ireland, resulting in the crop failures that led to this problem, and this is why thousands and thousands of Irish families came to America.

Anyway this are some of the things we did on Potatoes and starches week:

Mashed Potatoes 

Duchess Potatoes 

Croquette Potatoes 

Potato Gnocchi 

Potato Dauphinois 

Baked and Twice-Baked Potatoes 

Roasted Red Potatoes 

Rice Pilaf 

Risotto 

Polenta

You all have cooked at least one of the things from the list above, my two favorite are Mashed potatoes and Potato Dauphinois when it comes to potato base dishes, and Risotto when it comes to rice base dishes. 

The secret about mashed potato is the cream, a good mashed potato is a creamy mashed potato, in class we were taught to add heavy cream and butter, enough to make it creamy, you can add parmesan cheese if you want, or any other cheese you feel like. 

I personally follow this 3 steps: Boil, smash and season, besides adding heavy cream and butter during the smashing step, it is as easy as that people. I hope you enjoy. 

Potato Dauphinois, beautiful name right? was a discovery to me, I had never tried it, I guess I'm just not a frequent restaurant visitor, LOL, but believe me, it is delicious. 

Dauphinoise is the French method of baking potatoes in milk, cream and cheese. In the French region of Dauphine, every home cook has her own formula for preparing this gratin. 

You first need to make potato slices, very thin that you will later consecutively put one over the another, making like a flowery design, for each cap, you add cream and spread shredded gruyere cheese, or parmesan cheese, or any cheese you want, plus salt and pepper, and then repeat the process until you fill the bowl. To finalize place in the oven until gratin, you can let it rest, but before you serve it, put it back in the oven for at least 5 minutes. 

Risotto, Risotto, Risotto! Yum, we all love Risotto, I Heart Risotto, I really do, and the great thing about this is that you can cook any kind of it, veggie risotto, beef risotto, seafood risotto, the list is endless. 

Week Five Update: Vegetables!!

Time definitely flies! my trimester as from today is almost over! I must admit I've learned a lot! pretty much more than I had expected before beginning this course! 

Week 5 was all about Vegetables, yes, yummy vegetables that we either hate or adore! in my case I love vegetables! except for 1 or 2 that I've been terrorize to eat since I was a kid. 

The noun "Vegetable" means an edible plant or part of a plant, excluding most of the time seeds and most sweet fruits. This typically means the leaf, stem, or root of a plant. 

According to some culinary experts "In a non-biological sense, the meaning of this word is largely based on culinary and cultural tradition. Therefore, the application of the word is somewhat arbitrary and subjective. For example, some people consider mushrooms to be vegetables even though they are not biologically plants"

Some vegetables can be consumed raw, some may be eaten cooked, and some must be cooked in order to be edible. Vegetables are most often cooked in savory or salty dishes. However, a few vegetables are often used in desserts and other sweet dishes, such as rhubarb pie and carrot cake. 

During week 5 of Fundamental's class we cooked Bake Acorn Squash, Braised Collard greens, Steamed Vegetables such as broccoli, Artichoke Bottoms gratin, Grilled Vegetable Skewers, Tempura Vegetables with dipping sauce (I must add I had the initiative of preparing a delicious dip, that could be eaten with literally anything), Savory glazed carrots, Glazed beets with lime (This is one of the vegetables that unfortunately I don't like) and Pan-fried Eggplant with tomato sauce (My favorite). 

So, lets talk about the process of cooking of two of my favorite dishes from week 5 at school; Artichoke Bottoms gratin and Pan-fried Eggplant with tomato sauce.

I must begin with telling the process of peeling an artichoke:

Cut off the stem of each artichoke, leaving up to an inch. The stems tend to be more bitter than the rest of the artichoke. With kitchen scissors remove the pointed ends of the bottom row of leaves and trim the top of the artichoke by one-third. Pull off any smaller leaves toward the base and on the stem. 

In class we did it a bit different, we used our Chef knife instead of kitchen scissors, and we went all the way to get to the bottom and get the artichoke heart, which is the most tender part of it, this video sums it up. 

This is a recipe you will enjoy cooking and eating, I found one specially for you online, in the Martha Stewart webpage, http://www.marthastewart.com/313465/artichoke-bottoms-au-gratin 

I hope you enjoy, but before here's a tip:

The artichoke bottoms and the bechamel sauce can be prepared the day before you need them, then assembled and baked just before serving.

Pan-fried Eggplant with tomato sauce, one of my favorite meals of all time, it's actually a very simple recipe and a fun one too.

Trim the ends from the eggplant. Remove strips of peel, lengthwise, with a chef’s knife, leaving narrow strips of peel between the cuts. Cut into round slices 1/4 inch thick. Sprinkle both sides of the slices of eggplant with kosher salt. Place in a colander or on a rack to purge excess moisture and bitterness for 30 to 35 minutes. Rinse off the slices and blot dry with a paper towel.

Warm the Fresh Tomato Sauce to 165°F (74°C). Bread the eggplant using a standard breading procedure

Preheat a 10-inch sauté pan. Add 1/4 inch of vegetable oil to the pan. When the oil is hot, pan-fry the eggplant slices until golden-brown, then turn and cook until the other side is golden-brown, 2 to 3 minutes per side. Remove and drain on clean paper towels or a rack.

Arrange the slices  and top with warm Fresh Tomato Sauce, Parmesan and Mozzarella cheese and place in the oven until gratin. 

Serve hot.

See you soon readers. I hope you enjoy my cooking tips.. but before, here are some pictures of some other things we cooked this Vegetable week. 

Week 3 and 4; Soups, Creams and Eggs !!!

As I've been blogging my experiences through out this course, week 3 happened, in fact. it happened 2 weeks ago, No I have not been lazy to write, Yes I was very busy doing important paperwork regarding my school status. Anyway, week 3 and 4 happened recently and I decided to make an entry to talk about what I learned and did during those dates. 

During week 3 (Each trimester lasts 11 weeks) I learned how to cook Soups, Consommes and Creams, I must said I loved it, first, because I've never been a fan of soups, and from that day on I'm sure I'll change my mind a bit, I guess when you are a little kid and your mom pleases you by cooking something else cause you hate soup, you cut the possibility of ever trying it, unless of course you go to Culinary School like me. 

So, soups, let's talk a bit about soups, I love the anthropology and history of foods, it makes it really interesting to cook something when you know the process it went through history for you and I eating it today. 

Soup is generally a warm food! yes! and it's made by combining ingredients such as meat and vegetables with stock, juice, water, or another liquid.  The word soup comes from French soupe ("soup", "broth"), which comes through Vulgar Latin suppa ("bread soaked in broth"). Evidence of the existence of soup can be found as far back as about 6,000 BC. Boiling was not a common cooking technique until the invention of waterproof containers (which probably came in the form of clay vessels). Animal hides and watertight baskets of bark or reeds were used before this. To boil the water hot rocks were used. This method was also used to cook acorns and other poisonous plants. (Wikipedia Source). 

 During week 3 of Class, we cooked French Onion Soup, Consomme, Split Pea Soup, Mushroom Cream and Chicken pot pie. (This last one will be as since that day my favorite Soup Ever) 

French Onion Soup is an onion and beef stock or broth served with croutons and cheese. Making French onion is very easy, you need to have Veal stock of course, this is the base for this soup. 

First, the sliced onions must be caramelized, this is the most important step, as the brown caramelized onions will color the characteristic brown of it, which is also enhanced by the natural brownish color of the beef stock.

The caramelization process in this case, is the procedure in which the onions are cooked slowly until the melting sugars approach burning temperature, becoming brown. In the final stages of cooking, red wine is often used to enhance the caramelized onion flavor and to deglaze the pan.

To finalize the cooking process of French Onion Soup, we have to brown the bread (Plain Bread can be used) and this is done by putting it into the oven til' is brown and crusty, after this, we put the soup in a heat resistant vessel and place the crouton and later sprinkle cheese on top, Gruyere cheese should be used in this final step. 10 minutes in the oven to melt the cheese and Ta-ran-tan-tan, one of the most delicious soups ever invented will be ready to eat.

You are probably used to eat consomme to fight a cold, at least I am, but is actually a very nice simple soup each one of can make in a litle time and drink during a cold night. Consommé is a type of clear soup made from richly flavored stock or bouillon that has been clarified usually through a fining process. A consommé is made by adding a mixture of ground meats, together with mirepoix tomatoes, and egg whites into either bouillon or stock. Guess what as you might imagine, after you bring this to a simmer, for a considered amount of time, or as of before the raft forms. you drain it and get the liquid. It should be really clear.

Consommés are usually served piping hot because they tend to cool down more quickly than other soups. They are most often served with garnishes, which vary in complexity from a simple splash of sherry to cut vegetables.

I must add my least favorite soup is split pea, first, it is kind of a process to cook and second, I'm just not convinced by the flavor of it yet, peas are very healthy tho, and a big source of protein I must add. The thing about this soup is that it can be made completely vegetarian and that's great news for vegetarians out there, cause most soups are based on animal stock. But if you are a big fan of this soup, then you have to try making it at home, whether you use Vegetable or Animal Stock. Since I'm not that big fan of Split peas, you my dear readers can check any of the thousands recipes available on the Internet (lol). I'm just kidding. But for real, split pea soup is probably your grandmother's favorite and I'm pretty sure she holds a very easy and delicious recipe.

Cream of Mushrooms is my favorite cream ever, it's so delicious and learning how to cook it really made my day. But the true highlight of Soups Week was not only learning how to cook but also learning about the existance of Chicken Pot Pie, I swear I had no idea about the existance of this unbelievable delicious dish. I read that The Chicken pot pie gets its ancestry from the Greeks and Romans, where the Greeks cooked meats in open pastry shells called artrocreas however it was the Romans who added to top crust making the first pot pies. But this dish just never entered nowhere near Venezuelan borders hahaha.
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Week Four was all about eggs, wether you believe or not, there are thousands of recipes for egg cookery, in fact, we depend so much on this particular product, that we probably take for granted the fact that is in most of the things we eat, just to name a few; pasta, cakes, mayonnaise, bread etc etc etc.

Do you think you can live without eating bread, or cakes? I honestly don't think so! and I'm pretty sure most vegans (Vegetarians who don't eat any animal product) probably don't know this.

So let's talk about eggs, during week 4 we mainly focus on this recipes

Fried Eggs 

Poached Eggs 

Eggs Benedict 

Hard and Soft Boiled Eggs 

Scrambled Eggs 

Rolled Omelet 

Crepes

Eggs benedict are one of my favorite breakfast dish, it consists of two halves of an English muffin, topped with ham or bacon, poached eggs and Hollandaise sauce.

Apart from being a popular ingredient, eggs can also be prepared in sundry ways that make it a stand-alone meal. Whether it's heated, beaten or mixed, an egg's consistency and appearance is a result of denatured proteins. Egg white is made of globular proteins suspended in water. When heated, the globular proteins become agitated and unwind to form a stiff network throughout the surrounding water. Eggs cooked at high temperatures for a longer period of time will develop more bonds and acquire a rubbery texture. But heat isn't the only force that can denature globular proteins, beating also alters their structure with the incorporation of air bubbles. This effect is seen is dishes like meringues or soufflés, where egg whites are beaten to form tight networks around air bubbles which remain after the bubbles pop. The protein in yolks also helps eggs combine with other ingredients. Egg yolks can be mixed to form emulsions because they contain amino acids that repel and attract water. When combined with oil and water, some amino acids will adhere to the water while others will adhere to the oil. Foods like hollandaise sauce and mayonnaise are made from egg yolk emulsions.