Culinary school quotes of the week, Week 15

Up in flames?
 "Pay attention to the fat so we don't catch the place on fire and burn it down."
-- Chef Dan Fluharty, noting that the last time we used deep fryers in the classroom kitchen, oil temperatures rose to a dangerous 500 degrees Fahrenheit.

That's Mr. Knucklehead to you, buddy
"Look at this pot. What knucklehead cooked the couscous?"
-- Culinary student Rob Park seeing the grain burned black in a pot. The prescribed way to make couscous is to add hot liquid, not put it over a flame. The pot was mine.

Season with care
"Do you want to put so much seasoning on it that it burns the chef's mouth? No!"
-- Chef Dan Fluharty's reference to one student's liberal use of white pepper.

Culinary grammar
"Do we still lemon it? It's a verb now."
-- Culinary student Aline Brown altering language usage as part of her kitchen experience.

Goldilocks spinach: just right
"This is not spinach soup, and it's not a brick. If you do it right, there's little better than creamed spinach."
-- Executive Chef Michael Weller upon learning that our class had a bit less than success with the dish on our first outing with it.

Culinary school quotes of the week, Week 8

It's a sure thing
"Shrimp always sells. If you think you're going to have trouble selling something, add shrimp."
-- Chef Dan Fluharty (left), explaining the making of shrimp bisque and telling us that many a restaurateur has gotten by using the tasty little crustacean.

Non-sequitir of the week
"My question is actually about bleaching. Can we bleach these?"
-- Culinary student Molly Lester (below left), tugging at her white chef's jacket and stopping Chef Dan's soup demo.

Let there be no uncertainty
 "When in doubt, add salt."
-- Culinary student Fontaine McFadden, responding to Chef's question of what she had learned that day.

Cooking unconventionally
"The Portuguese are just like anyone else on the planet: Just because they have a recipe doesn't mean we have to follow it."
-- Chef Dan Fluharty, acknowledging that the "national soup" of Portugal, caldo verde, can be made with rice rather than potatoes as the starch.

We'll talk bonus later
"All this fun and you'll get paid for it."
-- Executive Chef Michael Weller making note of students actually enjoying themselves while cooking in Culinary Foundations II.

Culinary school quotes of the week, Week 6

Making note
"You have great notes, (student No. 1). Let me see your notes, (student No. 2). Oh, you were sleeping that day."
-- Chef John Meidinger (right) tells students to rely on their notes as part of reviewing for final exams.

Game over; face the music
"Stop playing with your food and just bring it up here."
-- Chef Tony Marano showing his eagerness to taste and judge the gazpacho and mayonnaise dishes that students were hovering over for too long during the skills test final exam.

Modesty is the best policy
"The changing room on the second floor is empty."
-- Executive Chef Michael Weller's hint to students he saw in various states of undress at their lockers in a public space in the third-floor hallway of the Academy.

Punctuality or power?
"The chef is never late."
-- Chef John Meidinger's response to a student who said, "You're late," when Chef walked into the 1 p.m. class at 1:02 p.m. to administer the final exam.

More than a dash of wisdom
"Here's a hint: I've never rejected a dish for having too much salt in it."
-- Chef Tony Marano (left) as he watched students stressing over salting their gazpacho and mayonnaise dishes for the skills test final exam.

Learning 'le cuisine' the hard way is the only way

The adage that we learn more from mistakes than successes has proven true at the midway point of my first term at the California Culinary Academy.

Five stitches and four blisters later, my knife skills are much improved, I can stir up a roux on my way to making sauces, I now know the fundamentals of restaurant and food-service safety and sanitation, and I can name and relate the uses for a wide array of pots, pans and fundamental kitchen equipment and tools.

As a result of the stitches, I learned a better way to core a tomato for concassé (turn the tomato, not the knife, to reduce the danger of knife slippage).

The blisters came when I was stirring my first in-class roux and bits of molten butter and flour splashed onto my hands. But I made a good brown roux, which helped me make a flavorful espagnole sauce.

I've learned these most basic of the basics from two excellent chef instructors and from listening to and observing my fellow students, both in their own successes and mistakes.

Executive Chef Michael Weller, who oversees the culinary arts program, said during orientation on Sept. 19 that the first six weeks, that is the first term, would be the most difficult. So far, it has been difficult and intense, but also energizing and challenging in many positive ways.

Next comes building confidence, manifest in increased assertiveness at the cutting board, mixing bowl and stovetop.

(Photo courtesy of fellow culinary student Keejoo Hon)

'You've got to earn your way into our kitchens'

We're about to find out how little I know about cooking.

Nine months of what promise to be grueling classes at San Francisco's California Culinary Academy, an affiliate of Le Cordon Bleu, begin in eight days. The opportunities and the challenges were laid before me and 100-plus other new students on Saturday at the Academy by the chefs in charge.

"The first six weeks will be the hardest," Chef Michael Weller said in an impromptu hallway conversation with a group of us during orientation. "You've got to earn your way into our kitchens."

In other words, no access to the CCA's gleaming kitchens until we learn a few basics. First and foremost is passing the safety and sanitation class, followed by the first-level culinary class.

Chef Weller, who is senior executive chef at CCA and oversees the culinary arts program, laid out some of the basics.

In safety and sanitary, we will learn how to cook and keep clean in the kitchen, the right (meaning safe) temperatures for cooking and serving meats and a host of other critical pieces of information.

In Foundations I, the first culinary arts class, we will learn kitchen terminology and definitions, including fundamentals of the seven classic French cooking techniques, the names and purposes of kitchen utensils and equipment and the descriptions of and uses for sauces, stocks and soups.

We will also learn, Chef Weller assured us in a booming voice, that the culinary industry needs us because it needs new blood.

"This school is not just about chopping things up," he said. "It's about learning leadership to keep changing our business."

With all due respect, Chef, I beg to differ, ever so slightly: It is about chopping things up, most of all the preconceived notions I'm carrying about how to cook and do it well.

It will be fun and challenging to find out just how much I have to learn. In more than five decades of hanging around kitchens, I think I have learned a good bit. The next nine months are likely to shed more light on that knowledge but to add a body of knowledge that will inflame my passion for cooking ever more so.