Fairytale Kitchen.

Over the past few weeks I've been Cinderella, apprentice pastry chef, nervous wreck and dish-pig. Which was my favourite you ask? The second of course!

At work with Winter closing in, the sea side dining scene is coming to an all time low. Summer usually brings in over 200 people for lunch alone and today we had 10 which means lucky me gets to play Cinderella in the kitchen; getting on my hands and knees or standing on benches scrubbing the walls. There is only one difference... I have no ball to go to, no fairy godmother and no shiny glass slippers.

The slow in customers does have its perks though. I was the resident apprentice pastry chef over the weekend & loved it! Frenchie showed me how to make lemon caramel, chocolate ganache, vanilla panna-cotta and how to make bread. I got to plate up desserts all day and finished work smelling like chocolate and sugar... not prawns. I felt inspired :)

Being a nervous wreck was last week because I had my practical exam for TAFE. We had to cook:
- Pasta with Duxelles in a Cream sauce
- Pan Fried Chicken breast with a tomato reduction sauce along side buttered beans, glazed carrots and chateau potatoes.
- Apple compote with orange segment garnish
- Anglaise Sauce

I was a huge nerd and practiced the 2 nights before :) Good news though. I didn't scramble my Anglaise sauce...

Cooking my custard with my ice bowl and spoon ready.

AND...

Practising my tiny wine barrel potatoes :)

because I practiced my (hated) turned potatoes I had the hang of it. Yes, I stood in my kitchen for what felt like hours and wasted about half of each potato turning them. Was worth it though as they turned out pretty damn good ;)

*Here's an interesting fact about Chateau potatoes that I found out the other week; the reason the potatoes are turned and have 7 sides for chateau potatoes is because the 7 sides represent the 7 wine regions in France and the potato looks like a tiny wine barrel. It all makes sense now... I still don't like doing them and am very happy I don't have to do them at work.


Dish-pig = blurrr! That was me today. As I mentioned before its slow at the moment at work and will only get slower due to the cold weather. This means they don't roster on a kitchen hand and me being the shit kicker was demoted to dish-pig. Ok I exaggerate a little... it wasn't all day but it felt like I had the worst pots and pans to wash up compared to everyone else.

New Subject at TAFE tomorrow... soups, stocks and sauces.

Thanks for reading and keep watching for more frequent (I promise) updates!