Last week we had a final exam and completed module 3. The practical portion was to bake, fill, frost and decorate a three layer cake. Simple, really. I mainly got points deducted because of my chocolate cornet handwriting. The "H" of my "Happy" (we each had to write "Happy Birthday + our name") was too different than the one in "Sarah". It was as if one was in Times New Roman 12, and the other looked more like Arial 14. Seriously.
At this point in my coursework, we are simply given a list of ingredients and measurements, then a baking “method” at the bottom. For example, 3oz. X, 2Tbs Y, 5 eggs. High ratio method. We are expected to know in what order and in what way to mix the ingredients so that they result in an edible concoction, one that is a close replication of what Chef had demoed at some point during the module. I wont bore you with more exam details, as you have heard about them in older posts. Let me tell you about Trailing.
A trail is the culinary world’s equivalent of an interview. Though I cannot tell you how trails work across the board, I cant tell you about one of my experiences and let you assume that this is standard practice.
I arrived at my first trail at a predetermined time. To the trail one wears interview clothing, which is quickly changed for a chef’s jacket, silly checkered pants, an apron, comis hat, side towels and orthopedic shoes. In addition to a change of clothes, basic equipment is brought to a trail. I chose two knifes, a peeler, spatulas, measuring spoons, zesters and other small implements and toted them in my knife roll. I witnessed another girl on her trail who brought her entire pastry kit in a large duffel- unnecessary and unwanted in a small kitchen with very limited space (she made me look great, though!). Upon arrival, I was introduced to the Chef, shown around the kitchen and given five minutes to change (I think that my coat was in this entire time, making my “nice interview clothes” completely irrelevant). Then the fun began.
I walked up to the chef and asked her where to start. You see, at a trail you must perform whatever task the chef tells you to do. Over the course of my trails, I peeled, chopped, mixed, baked, rolled and sliced. Any simple task that I couldn’t mess up too badly was asked of me. While nothing was too daunting, I still managed to screw up rather splendidly. After peeling a dozen pears, making cheesecake and rolling out rum balls, Chef asked me to make graham crackers that are crumbled up and used in one of their plated desserts (why not use Nabisco? Because these graham crackers are just plain BETTER. More of a mix between a gingerbread cookie and a packaged graham cracker). I jumped at this opportunity to bake something instead of just prepare the ingredients for Chef. I was using the recipe, measuring everything out and dumping it into the Hobart. A Hobart is like a massive stand mixer, about five times the size of your run of the mill kitchen aid. I was making a lot of graham cracker. After measuring everything and mixing all of the dry ingredients together (simple one step mixing method) I glanced back at the recipe. The recipe was given in grams. I looked at the scale. The scale was set to ounces. My heart sank. (To clarify why this was so horrifying- in professional kitchen we don’t usually use measuring cups to measure ingredients- they aren’t accurate enough, especially on a large scale. Instead we use kitchen scales to measure everything, and they have different settings- ounces, liters, pounds, grams….) Now do you understand why this was such a problem?
I admit, for a moment I wasn’t going to say anything, just play it cool. The dough would bake, and maybe even look right! After all, they weren’t gong to use my graham crackers until after I was out of the kitchen- maybe they would never find out it was me! This may be an obviously bad move to most of you, but really, would you want to fess up to something SO dumb on a job interview, when you could likely be spared the embarrassment, judgment and annoyance of Chef? Don’t worry, I admitted my mistake, sparing dozens of diners a terrible dessert experience...but I was close to just walking away.
I tapped Chef on the shoulder and got it over with (I replaced the look of feigned confidence I was sporting for an apologetic and defeated one and said something a long the lines of "Chef? *grimace* I made a big mistake..."). I think we had to throw out a couple pounds of flour and various other ingredients in the end. But I started over and mercifully got it right the second time.
Trailing is difficult for many reasons, but that particular trail was hard because I had n idea when I could leave. Chef kept asking me to do more things. Five hours passed. Six. Seven. Finally, eight hours after I arrived at the restaurant I was told that I could leave. I changed back into my “fancy interview clothes” and spoke to the Chef- for about five seconds. “We’ll be in touch” she said.
Needless to say, that while I have been in touch, she hasn’t responded to my emails.
-Sarah (Palatino Linotype 12)
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