Mystery basket menus for final exam

What one knows about cooking is only as good as how well one can apply the knowledge when those 60,000-BTU burners are fired up. That's the left brain-right brain dance that occurs in the kitchen.

Then there's what I call the "third brain," a mystical element that catalyzes the cognitive and the creative in the culinary arts, bringing about magical results that a scientist could explain but whose properties are better left to the imagination.

All the knowledge we have acquired in the last 18 weeks, and all the skill we have built in applying it must come together for magical results on Wednesday in final competency cooking exams in Culinary Foundations III.

First test will be that after fabricating a whole chicken, we will take one breast and make a meal of it, in 45 minutes. More about my plan for that in a blog posting later today.

Second test will be prepping, cooking and plating another meal from a specified menu in one hour, what Chef Dan Fluharty has called "the mystery basket." He revealed mystery basket contents on Friday:

1. Seared and oven-finished breast of duck with sauce bigarade, herbed couscous, seasonal vegetable, garnish.
2. Grilled New York steak with roasted garlic compound butter, pommes duchesse, creamed spinach and garnish.
3. Poached snapper with salmon mousseline, caper beurre blanc, rice pilaf, seasonal vegetable and garnish.
4. Seared and oven-finished rack of lamb with hazelnut crust, mint demi-glace sauce, potatoes croquettes, Brussels sprouts and garnish.
5. Grilled pork chop with sauce chasseur, potatoes anna, sauté of green beans and red bell peppers and garnish.

Before we drew numbers on Friday from Chef's toque blanche to determine who makes which plate, the buzz among the 10 of us was that the highest degree of difficulty is with the poached snapper because of the mousseline. That's a stuffing that must be prepped and piped into the rolled fish fillet.

Perhaps. But every one of the five has its challenges, not only in getting the protein cooked properly, but in the balance between crispness and overdoneness in vegetables, the delicacies of the sauces and the seasoning needed to bring the starches to full flavor.

On Tuesday, I will reveal which of the five I drew and my game plan for it.

Lifting the veil on the "mystery" final exam

Six days before our final exam in Culinary Foundations III, Chef told us a bit of what to expect in his "mystery basket" challenge. We will prep, cook, plate and present one of five entrées, plus a starch, vegetable, sauce and garnish.

The five are New York steak; salmon fillet; duck; rack of lamb; a white fish with mousseline, which is a stuffing made from salmon. We have cooked them all, and we know that each has its own particular challenges, mostly involving the right temperature and timing to cook it to Chef's specifications.

Classmates walked away hoping aloud that they wouldn't draw the white fish and salmon mousseline, which probably is the most complex of the five.

My preference is rack of lamb, which I did best with when we cooked it earlier. But I will be prepared for and take on whatever the culinary gods direct my way.

Chef said we will draw slips of paper from a box on Monday to determine who cooks what. That will give us two days to plan a production timeline.

(Photo shows my rack of lamb plating from earlier in the term.)

Today's menu: lamb, asparagus and hollandaise, soup

Another challenging three-course meal is on the board for today's Culinary Foundations III class. This will be our fourth three-course plating this week. Not complaining; the cooking practice and learning are why I'm in school.

First course: Salad of unspecified ingredients and dressing.

Second course: Cream of mushroom soup.

Main course: Roasted rack of lamb, accompanied by a sauce from the pan drippings; poached asparagus with hollandaise sauce; Potatoes Anna (sliced, arranged in an iron skillet in circular pattern with butter for sauté, then baked into place before being sliced like pie for service).

My biggest challenges will be: cooking the lamb to medium rare; extending my streak of five straight successful hollandaise sauces without breaking one.

As always, the key to success will be timing.