Our very first proper cooking lesson, and we aren’t actually cooking, but learning how to use a knife and all the basic cuts that are used in classical French cooking.
The lessons are basically conducted thus: a 3-hour demonstration by our chef teacher, and a related 3-hour practical session to actually execute what we saw during the demo.
Demo #1: All about knife cuts. We were shown the various types of cuts typically used in classical French cooking. Terms like macedoine, julienne, batonnet, brunoise, ciseler, were thrown at us, along with instructions on how to achieve these cuts, and what the end results should look like.
Various types of vegetable cuts (and a stray iPhone)
We were also introduced to the holy trinity of flavouring agents, the mirepoix, which comprises onions, celery and carrots. And also a very useful tip that we learned is in the mirepoix, the onions always make up 50% of the mix, with carrots and celery making up 25% each, except when you are making a white mirepooix (when you don’t want colour in the stock), in which the carrot is replaced with leeks, which is also from the onion family, in which case, the celery makes up 50% of the the mirepoix and onions and leeks make up 25% each.
The mirepoix
We were also taught how to make a bouquet garni, which I absolutely love to make, because it just looks so cute. Cut a nice big outer leaf from a leek, place inside the leaf a celery leaf, a couple of parsley stalks (save the leaves for something else like garnish), a bay leaf, and a sprig of thyme (crush these 2 to release their flavours) and tie it up with a string, and trim off the ends. I love how these little sticks of bouquet garni look.
Bouquet Garni. Little cigarette sticks of fragrant herbs.
It might sound amazing, but yes, an entire 3-hour session was devoted to cutting vegetables.
The demo was immediately followed by our first practical session, during which we put into practice what we were shown. Finally, a chance to use the knives!
The knives! From left: turning knife, paring knife, boning knife, carving knife, chef’s knife, cleaver, bread knife, fork, sharpening steel.
The carrier case. Also contains whisk, pastry brush, palette knives, and a whole bunch of other useful stuff.
Our first chef tutor was Chef D. He reviewed again the types of cuts he demonstrated during the lesson and we then had to execute and show him what we’d done. I didn’t do too shabbily. Oddly enough, I’m quite good with the fine cuts like a fine julienne and chiffonade, but not so great with the bigger cuts. I need to learn how to cut straight. I have to completely unlearn how I’ve been using my knife all this time. And I was cutting extremely slowly. These knives were amazing. Amazingly sharp. Such a joy to use.
And the best thing about the day, Chef said my cuts were good, and that I was pretty precise, and asked what I did in life. Told him I sold books. And he said, “Good job.”
Yay!
elceebee 