Day 5

Friday.

Enhanced sauce.

We made a few emulsifications today as well as got some tofu and panna cotta started.

We made an apple and arugula salad to go with our macadamia goat cheese.  It had candied hazelnuts and a white wine vinaigrette.

I accidentally dropped my mandoline guard by the sink and look what I found! A plant growing out of the drain.  How cool is that little man?

Corn and mint ravioli in a tomato fondue.  I want to eat the tomato fondue with a cheese sandwhich.

Can I make a raw grilled cheese?  I will put my brain power towards it.

End of week 1.  Cheers!

Day 4

Plant based Sauces and Specialty Sauces.

Theresa tried to show us how to roast coffee beans.  No, roasted coffee beans are not a mother sauce.  That's ok though.  They are pretty interesting.  The roaster didn't like the power supply at MKOKC, unfortunately, so it didn't work.  We may field trip out to her place to see the beans in action later in the month.

Today we made a Thai salad and a green curry.

This salad is amazing.  It has coconut meat noodles and pineapple in it.  The dressing is a creamy sesame which is the perfect combination for the pineapple.  The noodles are soft and contrast perfectly with the curried cashews.  I wish I had thrown in a handful of cilantro.  I used it for garnish, but it would have been a perfect addition throughout.

The green curry was not my favorite.  I like the technique, but not so much the curry spice.  We used kelp noodles along with coconut noodles and spiralized squash.  Summer squash is in season and delicious right now.

Day 3

Tomato Sauces

Today we made a romesco and a muhammara.  The muhammara was for our mezze plate and the romesco was for some king oyster mushroom calamari.... yum.

We also, grabbed our mac cheeses and flavored them.  Then we herbed the outside and put them in the fridge.  They will be used multiple ways as they age.

The herbs I used were dill and parsley.  I also cracked a little black pepper on it.

The mezze platter.  Zucchini hummus with eggplant bacon, hemp seed tabouli, muhammara with olive and orange crackers.

King oyster mushroom calamari with tartar and romesco sauces.  The calamari was good, but I put too much oregano in my breading.  Oops!

Day 2

Day 2 was Vegetable sauce. 

We made a simple veggie stock using juiced carrot, celery and tomato.  We dehydrated our our sauces to thicken them.  Then we used them to make an amazing modern take on miso soup.  It was incredible.  The soup has chopped avocado, tomato, macadamia nuts and pine nuts in it.  

We made and plated our beet gnocchi.  Both cream sauces were amazing.  We made a quick parsley gremolata with lemon zest to add brightness to the heaviness of the cream and root veggies.  We made two different shaped gnocchi.  I like the smaller traditional shapes.

We did other things that I didn't take pictures of and can't remember.  I think we made curried cashews to dehydrate...maybe.

OKC take 2!

Week 1 was awesome.  And slow.  It has taken me some time to get back into the swing of things.  It is again an all girl class.  There are 5 of us. These posts will be a bit condensed and I will post them all at the same time.

This week we focused on mother sauces.  The traditional French mother sauces are: bechamel, espagnole, hollandaise, tomato and veloute.  In raw cuisine, they are a bit different.

Day 1 was cream sauce. We made a sage cream sauce and a truffle cream sauce to plate with beet gnocchi.  You will see these later in the program.

We made milk.  6 different kinds.  Then we tasted them to see the flavor differences.  I made oat groat milk.  Which I found surprisingly delicious.

The other kinds we tasted were Pecan, Pistachio, Macadamia, Walnut, Hazelnut and Cashew.

After we made our milks, we sweetened them.  Sweetening really changes the flavor of some of the milks.  Then, with our milks we made chocolate custard.  We used avocados as the base.  It is amazing how different each pudding tastes just using a different flavored milk.  Also amazing, it does not taste like avocado.  Yumm. :)

We made eggplant bacon (they don't do it in level one anymore) and olive and orange crackers for a mezze platter that we plated later in the week.

We started a macadamia nut goat cheese and cashew cheese to age over the month.  Something interesting with nut cheeses; you can only ferment them for up to around 48 hrs, but you can age them for a month(maybe more!).

Norman, OK

If you go to OKC, visit Norman too.  It has lots of fun little shops:

Elusive is a vintage clothing store.  It is amazing.  If I lived in Oklahoma, I would be here every day.  I would probably try to get a job here.  As a plus, it doesn't smell like antique/vintage stores normally smell.  The owners are so sweet.  Also, if you see Elly's scarf there, we think she may have left it.  Please mail it to us.

Of course, go to Native Roots.

And Campus TV.  I bought a harmonica and two Jew Harps.  Plus, Jack lives there!

You want to go to here

Two more places you neeeeeeeeed to visit if you go to Oklahoma City:

Red Cup (Visit for the atmosphere, the food was nothing to write home about).  Though, to be fair, I only tried one thing.  It was a veggie sandwich.  It just didn't have much veggie to it.  It was disappointing.  The people are awesome though.  It felt like my hang out the minute I sat down.

And in Norman, The Earth Cafe & Deli (The Messy Mary is amazing!).  We all looooooved our food there.  Very yummy.  The coffee was pretty good too.  Well worth a visit. 

Finals!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Don't you hate it when people overuse exclamation points?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Me too!

Our Finals went really well.  And might I say, I nailed it.  Well, 2/3 nailed it.  My appetizer was a little bit weak.  I didn't have any ideas.   I wanted my entire meal to flow.  Here was my idea. 

Start with a Melon ap which leads into a BBQ entree and finishes with Vanilla Ice Cream for dessert.  It sounds good...but was it?

Yes, it was.

Spring Melon Trio:
Asparagus wrapped in Savignon Blanc Cantaloupe with Lime Zest
Melon, Dill, Chia Seed Soup
Two cheeses: Sumac and Balsamic Lime cheese

The ap needed more time for recipe testing.  It was a good idea, but not the best execution.  However, my entree was awesome.

I did an Open faced "Pulled Enoki" sandwich in a Sweet BBQ sauce with caramelized onions, arugula and House made Pickles.  It was served with cheesy asparagus spears.

My dessert, which I will apologize for now, was not photographed.  Why didn't I photograph it?  What is wrong with me?  I don't know.  I'm sorry, imagine it if you will:
Vanilla Bean Pecan Ice Cream in an Espresso bath with candied pecans and shaved chocolate.  It was so damn good.  I will make it for you if you come over to my house.  It was delicious.  People talked about it.  That's how good it was.

People talked about my ice cream and my pickles.  Wtf? (Also, please just read this as W-T-F.  It doesn't stand for anything.  It has become it's own exclamation.)  The pickles?  I didn't think they were that amazing.

The other girls:
Britanny made Cheese stuffed Sweet Peppers, Cauliflower Rice(which was amazing) and Grilled Veggie Enchiladas.  Her dessert was Chocolate Orange pudding.

Danae made Sauteed Maitake and Lions Mane dipped in butter, a Cheese Tartlet with Heirloom Tomatoes and Beet and Kale Chips with a tangy Yogurt sauce.  Her main was a Fillet of Coconut on Sea Vegetables in a Caper Pesto with Marinated Veggies.  Her dessert was Strawberry Champagne Sorbet with Cream filled Raspberries.

Elly made a Cheese Stuffed Heirloom Tomato, and two kinds of Wrapped Vegetables.  One was heartier: Roasted Bell Pepper and Mushrooms in a Zucchini wrap, the other lighter: Sprouts and Springs Peas in a Summer Squash Wrap.  Her Main was a Mixed Greens salad in a citrus dressing with Fresh Asparagus and her to die for dessert was a Vanilla Bean Strawberry Tart.  It was seriously amazing.  Amazing.  It had a Shortbread Crust.

Needless to say, we all graduated with flying colors.  yay us!