Week 4

Right so, HI. Been quite busy doing the cooking thing and everything but here's an update. Went to Belfast, Ireland last weekend to see Charlotte, Emer and Claire, 3 girls from camp. Had the nicest time, relaxing (maxin') and really just mucking around talking camp stuff and sight seeing etc. etc. Went out on the Saturday night to a club called Box and yeah you all know I don't club blah blah but it was fun, lack of talent, but it was a good time. Excellent spread for breakfast the next morning thanks to Emer ;), though i had the eggs covered :D

Titanic Museum - The titanic was built and assembled in Belfast, Ireland.

Leaning tower Clock

View from Belfast Castle

Belfast Castle garden

Belfast Castle

Loving Pimms in a can

Excellent spread

Belfast Castle, Charlotte & Claire

A cat maxin relaxin

Then, had a good week at school, cooked a few stews and a lemon meringue pie, a Christmas cake too :D

LMP

LMP

And to finish, last night, went to a friend from school, Remi's house and cooked up a storm! French beans with walnuts, watercress and caramelised onion salad, chilli and lime linguine with crab meat vichy carrots, and a baked artichoke with garlic. Nothing fancy for dessert, "just icecream"!

So yeah, that's my life in the last week, hope it keeps you all occupied for a bit. I'm having a great time, honestly just having a blast, so YAY :)

Speak soon, love Steffi.

Brownies and tart

Over the weekend I made Chilli and Chocolate Brownies (gluten free). I mixed together a basic brownie recipe but substituted the plain flour for rice flour, flour containing no gluten. Then when all the ingredients were combined, I added half a small chilli which I'd chopped finely so it wasn't seen in the brownies when cooked. Half wasn't enough to get the full kick I wanted so in future I'd probably add 1 to 1.5 chillies :) woo!

To follow the baking trend today in class we made pastry from scratch and filled it with a treacle based filling to make, well, Treacle Tart. Can't say it's something I'd want to eat all the time but my pastry got positive feedback, so yeah winner!

 

Delisch.

Speak soon, love Steffi.

Pork with quince and apple

Made dinner last night. Bought pork chops from the butcher near Leiths to make sure I was using the best stuff I could find.

Basically I just chopped the meat and fat off the bone, leaving an inch of fat on the skin side. I then scored the fat with x's and rubbed oil, salt and pepper into them. Next came the quince paste which was just evenly spread over the pink part of each chop. To follow I thinly sliced two apples and put two slices on top of the quince paste. I finished by sprinkling around six or seven fresh oregano leaves (fresh looks better, more rustic, blah blah) on top of the apple and brushed each chop, over the oregano, with melted butter for shine.

They were then roasted for around 20-25 mins at 220 c (fan forced) on a baking tray with baking paper and yum, pork, tender, melts in your mouth, deliciousness!!

Before:

After:

Depending on whether or not you like quince paste, I would say the more the merrier as a thick piece of pork will see the flavour of a thin layer of paste not come through!

Speak soon, love Steffi.

Day 3 - Eggs

So I now know every way eggs can be used ever, and could cook you a different breakfast for everyday of the year, WOO. It was truly eggcellent (what a cracker), etc. funny joke. etc. to learn something so basic as it really made you think about a simple ingredient you'd taken for granted originally. I'd always hated scrambled eggs till now as each time I'd eaten them they'd been rubbery with too much going on (milk, cream, cheese...) when to be honest all it needs is a bit of salt, white pepper and (salted) butter!

Speak soon, love Steffi.

Day 1

So today was my first day. We got given all our stuff for the duration of the course, chefs kit, knife set, scales and a locker. We were then sat as a group of around 50 in the 'demo' room and given a briefing on how everything was to pan out for the 10 weeks, mainly just a run down on how stuff goes ahead @ the college, nothing too interesting. Then we were split into 3 groups of 16 and introduced to our teachers. I'm 'White group C' and my teacher for the semester is a bloke called Michael Cropp who seems very nice and well versed, excellent. My class mates are mainly all girls, but I guess that was to be expected. WOOHOO first day at school. Practical work starts tomorrow! Can't wait to get my engraved knifes dirty ;)

Leiths

 

Goods

Books

Apron

Knives

Speak soon, love Steffi.