Day One

I had fun today, though I'm dragging due to a couple of night's of poor sleep. So here are just a few random, thoughts.

The school is impressive--sorta looks like a castle. It was an old winery that's been converted. I'll post a picture later.

The teaching kitchen is impressive--bank upon bank of stoves and cooktops, with all the requisite pans. Very cool place indeed. Pictures will certainly be forthcoming.

Our chef was the former pastry chef of the French Laundry. That kind of pedigree is impressive. He's incredibly charismatic, and talks at a rapid fire pace, with hardly enough time to catch a breath. He's clearly passionate about what he does, and enjoys sharing it with others. He has a partner who's helping to teach the class, though he's focusing on breads. Apparently one of the best in the business. I'm excited about the bread section: the first chef said that the products we'd be making are the best in Napa Valley, at least for the categories we're dealing with. I haven't had much success with bread, and so I haven't really explored it. I have a feeling this section could change my thinking.

We're an assorted lot of people. In no particular order: electrical engineering grad, with a minor in video game design; a Japanese man with a Korean fiancee. He is a cancer survivor which has changed his world view. He and his soon to be wife are both Christians, and they desire to reach out to the unchurched in Japan though a tent making ministry of a baking/pastry shop. It was interesting to hear this all come out during the intro section. Turns out his fiancee is an anchorwoman back in Korea. Let's see...there are about four accountants or accounting students. One law student, a biology student, a student in elementary education. Another woman is a software development team leader. (She's one whom I don't think I really like--we've had two mini-incidents, one where I sort of had to give her a little lip. I have a suspicion she's a B). There's another woman who's in a field she no longer wants to work in--can't recall what, but she worked in Taiwan for six months in a bakery, which caused her to decide she wanted to work in the field. There's also a guy who's brother just signed with Sony records, a singer/songwriter, and he is his brother's tour manager. And then there's me (and a few that I just can't quite remember right now). All in all there are 14 of us.

We made several things today. A couple of pound cakes, one lemon and the other a coffeecake/streusselly sort of thing. Pound cakes are by their nature dry concoctions, often requiring simple syrup or liquers poured over them to make them moist. These were both a little dry. The lemon one was tasty, but the other was something I'd never make at home, though I should reserve judgment, since the chef says that it tastes better the next day. (I just happen to have a bag of goodies on the counter here, so I know what I'm having for breakfast). We also made three kinds of cookies: good ole chocolate chip, which I actually didn't sample. They looked a little too done for my taste. It's funny...for me, a chocolate chip cookie is best when it's like the way mom made them growing up: Toll House cookies which are a little doughy in the middle. These were more browned, and baked longer than I would at home. That does two things, though: obviously, makes it more "cooked," and less doughy, and adds flavor through the carmelization of the sugar in the dough. Browning equals flavor. It's official name is the Maillard effect, for what it's worth. I wish I had tried the cookie, though apparently we have plenty of frozen dough in the freezer, and we'll be baking a few off each day for the communal dessert after dinner. I'll have to reserve judgment I guess until I actually try them.

The other cookie was a white chocolate/macadamia nut cookie. Can't go wrong here. It looked just like I would want a cookie to be: tender and soft in the middle, just right. Here again, though, I just didn't have a chance to sample one. Hopefully there are some more in the freezer, we'll see.

My team made the sable cookies, which were yummy shortbread type cookies with just a bit of spice and walnuts. I'll be making these at home myself, though probably with pecans instead of walnuts. These are essentially very tasty homemade Pecan Sandies, some of my favorite cookies, though these are much better than Keebler would make. These are our instructor's favorite cookies. I made a slight mistake, however. We sifted all the dry ingredients, and I actually added the salt as well, which at home is OK. Here, I believe the mesh is finer, so it eliminated some of the salt from going through. The instructor commented that the cookies were a little lacking in salt, and asked us if we had put the salt in. I told him we had, and that I had thought the same thing. It was later that I recalled my choice with the sifting, and figured that must have been the problem. Tasty nonetheless!

The final item was a batch of biscotti, which has never really excited me. These however were incredibly tasty, something I'll certainly make again in the future. They're definitely made for dipping, and I wished as I ate them that I was a coffee drinker. The chef suggest dipping them in chocolate too, and I believe a little chocolate coating, perhaps with a sprinkling of nuts, could only make these better. Friends and family will certainly be sampling these tasty treats!

One thing I didn't count on was a full dinner towards the end of the class. At 7:30, a massive bell is rung, and we all drop what we're doing, and sit down to eat food prepared at the Culinary Institute of America. I've had worse dinners! Tonight was excellent: some grilled chicken and sausage, broccoli with an Asian sauce, Israeli couscous with mushrooms and roasted red peppers, a salad with a champagne vinaigrette, and two kinds of hard rolls, baked fresh that day in the same kitchen we were using. Dessert? Made by our class. Pretty cool.

Anyway, there's a little briefing on today's class. I'm exhausted, so it's off to bed. Tomorrow morning, I'll be drinking wine in Napa Valley. The wineries open at 10:00--it's 1:00 back home, so no problem!