If you are queasy, you might want to skip the first part of today's notes......
We spent the morning "dispatching" (what a deceptive word!) cull lobsters (remember, less than perfect). That means we took our live lobsters, put then on a cutting board, (petted them to keep them from moving), the stuck a knife tip between their tail and body, then brought the knife down to cut their bodies in half. This is a quick and humane death for your lobster, rather than boiling them in a pot. I liked the fact that Chef Dale said we did not need to do this if we felt uncomfortable and were NOT to do it if we felt we could not go thru with the "dispatching". Once that was done, we pulled the tails off, then finished cutting the body in half and took off the claws and small legs.
Once we finished with the little lobsters, we learned how to shuck oysters. Every oysters has a different look depending on where they came from. The oysters we had today were from Maine. The bottom shell was rounded but the top shell was softer and flat. You use a special oyster knife to open the shell at the joint at the back of the shell, then twist the knife perpendicular to the shell to break the seal on it. You then run the knife flat along the middle of the shells to the other end of the oyster. Discard the top shell (unless you are doing a beach/shell theme project) and leave the oyster in the bottom shell along with its juice. Oysters can be eaten raw or cooked in some way. GardeMo made Oysters Rockefeller for lunch today. Oysters Rockefeller were first served at the Plaza Hotel in New York City. The oyster is removed and a small bed of cooked spinach, garlic, onions, parsley, cream, Pernod and vermouth is placed in each shell. The oyster is then placed on top of the spinach mix, given a dab of Mornay sauce and cheese and placed under the broiler to cook. They were pretty good!
As for Hot Plate, we took the lobster shells and added them to mirepoix that had been etuveed, then flambe them with brandy. Once the flame was out, white wine was added and the alcohol cooked out. Tomato paste was added, (you could use tomatoes that have been concasse)and fumet(fish stock) then heated to boiling. The claws were poached in this and then the tails of the lobster. While the fumet mix was simmering, we took the meat out of the tails, saving the fantail for garnishing and the meat out of the claws. Chef Dale seemed excited that this took little time. He said the last class barely finished. We set the meat in a hotel pan and set it aside to reheat later. The lobster meat was not fully poached so that we could reheat it without overdoing the lobster. Then we took the lobster shells out of the sauce (as much as you can anyway) and put the sauce thru a Robot Coupe. The sauce was then put back on the stove top so we could reduce it by at least a quarter. Then we strained it thru a chinoux and put it back in a clean pot on top of the stove. Roux was then added as well as paprika and cayenne and the sauce was left to thicken. Right before serving, we added reduced cream to the sauce and left it to continue to be warm. I made the basmati rice for this dish, called Lobster Americaine (although originally it was called Lobster Amorecaine-lobster love!), by starting to etuvee the minced onions on the stove, toasting the basmati rice with the onions, adding chicken stock, then baking the rice in the oven until it was done. It turned out well. This was probably the best lobster I have ever had-several other people thought the same!
Dessert was Lime Frozen Yogurt with Cold Watermelon Soup. The frozen yogurt was divine and the cold soup was just like eating really good watermelon. I was SO impressed! The frozen yogurt was in the shape of a pyramid, turned out onto a bowl, then the watermelon soup was poured around it from a coffee urn. YUMMO!
We got last week's test back. I only got an 89-not as good as I have been doing. More studying it in order, I think.......
That being said, I think I will go study
No comments:
Post a Comment