Today was a great day in class. We did grilling today, and I got to do something I've seen Rachael Ray do a hundred times, but have never done myself...paillard a chicken breast. It's not as satisfying as it looks. Maybe if you've had a really rough day and really need to pound something...but no, in reality you're just hitting something to make it as even as you can. Paying attention to how even you're making it takes some of the fun out of the randomness of just pounding something senseless. More on the chicken later. Our first dish here is the grilled salmon...which was basically the only composed plate of the day, so I liked it. I liked how we finished the lentils in pancetta fat, and I also got to practice my knife cuts, which I thought were beautiful (brunoise carrots and onions). Like yesterday, I also put the pancetta back into the lentils. Why not? The vegetables were marinated in some balsamic vinegar and oil, and I seasoned them with some salt and pepper right before they hit the grill. Otherwise, the eggplant would have definitely absorbed too much salt. I feel I got a little bit too much heat on the salmon...the quadriller (fancy word for the cross-hatch grill marks) was a bit darker than I wanted. But Chef Brown said if I composed this plate for the final, it should be exactly as I had it today. Wow, what a great compliment!
I loved the chicken marsala. Chicken Marsala makes me think of that Top Chef episode where they were supposed to recreate some of the classics, and whoever drew that knife had obviously never made it before and had no idea what went in it, what technique should be used...he basically just made a chicken dish that he liked. And that would have been me. Because I don't think I've ever had Chicken Marsala before today. The taste sort of reminded me of chicken at a Chinese restaurant, even though it is Italian. Delicious! Chef Brown said my presentation was great and the chicken was cooked beautifully, but that I'd overpeppered the dish and he felt a slight burn in the back of his throat when it went down. I tried it a few times, but I couldn't quite pick that up...although as I've said before, I am a bit of a pepper monkey at home. I just wish it had an accompaniment. I did have time. I should have made some pommes puree to soak up that delicious sauce!
Ok, this one hurt. This is the grilled sea bass with fine herbs sauce (parsley, tarragon, chervil and chives). First of all, this was not the dish I presented. I plated it, got into line, and realized I was serving fine herbs soup, not fine herbs sauce. So I took it back, replated the fish, reduced my cream sauce a bit, and did an extra step Chef Brown didn't demo...I mounted it with butter. It just needed a lot more thickness, as you can tell from this before picture. I wish I'd have gotten a picture of it after I redid it, but that didn't happen. Second of all, I decimated that skin. Look at it! Chef Brown said the fish was perfectly cooked, and he loved my final pan sauce. But obviously, that skin is mutilated. In lecture, he even specifically stated how proteins have a natural tendency to pull away from the pan when they're done and that you shouldn't keep poking and prodding at it. I poked. And I prodded. I just couldn't help it. I was so worried it was burning down there, I just had to see! Suffice to say, I did not like what I saw. Ah well, tomorrow we have sauteed duck breast with a dried cherry pan reduction sauce, grilled flank steak Asian style, and twice baked potatoes. Yum!
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