Exploding Butter

It's been a while since the last update, only because I have been working after school in the campus store, filling out my day at 12 hours. It's been tough, but I am enjoying it.

I finished Meat and Seafood Fabrication and Identification last week. It was great to learn what different cuts of meat look like and the best type of fish for certain dishes. I still feel relatively new to these subjects, but it will come as I practice more. Our chef for the course was a wonderful beginning to our career in the kitchen. Not intimidating, fun and energetic, all the qualities that we need in our first chef at the most prestigious culinary college in the world. It was also great to learn how to correctly fabricate these products so I can buy whole products and with the best yield, save a lot of money.

Our current class, Skills 1, is an introduction to knife cutting skills and stocks, is a blast. For the first time we are all working together in the kitchen. In fabrication we worked together, but we did not depend on each other for the different aspects of production. Now we count on every person of our team to get a specific task done, which is a realistic model of what will happen in a kitchen. We also have specific tasks and some students get to be the sous chef for the team or the class. I was a sanitor just last week, which means that I was the go to guy for all the cleaning and product distribution for our team. It was tough work because I lost precious minutes of production, but it was great to gain some more respect from the students.

We were clarifying butter just the other day and as Murphy, one of my teammates, and I were slowly sliding a pot across the burner, the saucepot of butter erupted and caught on fire. This was so crazy, yet we both came out of the fireball with every appendage and both of our eyebrows! Not even the chef was fully aware of what caused the explosion, but we figured that the slight movement of the pot caused the water molecules underneath the butter to burst through the oil. Anyways, I thought y'all would appreciate that story.

Currently, I am in the middle of volunteering for Worlds of Flavor. Check out the website--> http://www.ciaprochef.com/wof2010/ This is the biggest foodie conference right now in the world of culinary arts and I am so excited to be a part of it. This year's theme is Japan and our whole building has turned into an expert display of traditional Japanese cuisine. I will be working side by side with some of today's brightest and most honored Japanese chefs, while learning more about the culture of Japan. Iron Chef Morimoto will be here, as well as Thomas Keller (owner of The French Laundry), and many authors, including the editor of the late Gourmet magazine. It looks to be a wonderful event, I will update at the conclusion.

School has been busy, life is good. I sleep, eat, cook, work and do it all over again. My wife has been a wonderful blessing through all of this and I cannot wait to see where God takes us from here. Until next time, consider one of the CIA's many taglines:

Food is Life. Create and Savor Yours.

Daily Bite:
Clarified butter is butter that has had all milkfat solids and water removed. The ending product is pure butterfat. This helps raise the smoke point so that the butter will not brown as easily. Careful though, it might explode on your face and catch fire.