24 May 2012

Another crazy morning in the kitchen. It was all going so well until 9.35am when the giant wall clock I rely on to time all my recipes... stopped. It turns out I wasn't mad when I thought time was standing still as I kneaded my bread dough for what felt like an eternity - I had in fact been kneading for 20 minutes and had almost lost all feeling in my right arm.

Then came the Classic lemon meringue - a recipe which sneakily involves making three separate recipes - shortcrust pastry, lemon curd and meringue. The pastry could've been better, but I went with it anyway (my theory is after kneading, chilling, rolling and blind baking, you don't start again unless its inedible). The lemon curd looked a little lumpy, but it was nothing a good whisking wouldn't fix and who would see it under the meringue anyway? Which brought me to the final step - the meringue. Technically quite simple, but today the egg whites had chucked a tantrum and were not co-operating. I tried a few batches of mixture, I even tried a few different mixing machines, but nothing was working.  The teacher assured me "It's not you, its the eggs"... it was my first kitchen break-up. Finally, I got something which almost resembled stiff peaks, wrestled it into a piping bag and used what little arm strength I had remaining to squeeze out some little meringue mountains. Rather miraculously, I ended up with a half-decent looking pie, assisted greatly by my patented 'nana method' - when in doubt, use a decorative plate and a pretty flower - it draws the eye away from the imperfections.  

The white bread was my first time using yeast and I have to say it turned out rather well, despite taking over three hours to make. I called on my Hellenic heritage and made my dough with olive oil instead of butter, I figured now I don't have to feel guilty when I put butter on it. 

Today we learned how to cook: Sorrel tarragon and chard broth, Moroccan spiced lentil soup, Chunky vegetable and bean soup, French peasant soup (they may be poor, but they are still fussy about their grub), Breadsticks, Sunflower bread, Fougasse provencal flat bread (a bread with slit-like holes that make it look like a halloween mask ... creepy), Irish stew, Tagine of lamb, Couscous with apricots and pistachio nuts, Buttered cabbage (if you can grow it, we can butter it), Foragers salad, Asian savoy cabbage salad, Pear sable with warm caramel sauce, Shortbread stars with strawberries and cream and Fudge. 

For dinner this evening I decided to show off this week's accomplishments with a little sample plate of Irish farmhouse cheeses, my handmade butter, my strawberry jam, my adorable mini bread loaf, some spiced apple chutney (kindly given to me by another student) and a tomato and basil salad - followed by a generous slice of my lemon meringue pie and another Eurovision semi-final! The Editor is opening the wine, which is my cue to turn off the computer...