Day one hundred thirteen

Our plate for today

Making puree of asparagus soup.

The last day for this menu rotation. Today we were a vegetarian team. Tomorrow it will be our last menu for the A la cart cooking.

Today we cooked:
Ravioli Bercy with egg yolk
Millet and Cauliflower Puree
Sautéed Seasonal Green Vegetable
Beurre Noisette
Cream of Asparagus Soup.

Today was not a great day. We were back to the  arguing days and were not able to find a consensus. Result was obvious. Our dish was ok, but not great. Pasta dough was a bit too thick, the filling (ricotta and spinach) was a bit rough because of undercooked spinach. Sauce Beurre Noisette
we forget to make for the tasting plate, which is silly (the sauce is burnt butter with lemon juice and parsley).

The idea of ravioli is interesting. You have a filling, in our case ricotta with spinach and seasoning. When you assemble ravioli, you put filling making a well in the centre, then you put raw egg yolk, and cover with another sheet of dough. Since it is fresh pasta, you do need to cook it for a long time. Just cook a little bit in a boiling water and then finish in a pan with butter. Egg yolk will remain runny.

I cooked millet and cauliflower puree. I was not impressed with that component. Cauliflower was sautéed first, then millet was added, and vegetable stock. The mixture was simmering till millet was tender. After that al mixture was pureed in a blender. Roasted garlic was added for the flavor.

Also I cooked cream of asparagus soup. It was a big debate how to make it. I got a suggestion to blanch asparagus first and then to add it to the soup. The idea was to keep a green flavor. The idea did not strike me, because when you blanch asparagus you lose some of the flavor. At the end asparagus was sautéed in butter and added to the soup to simmer and develop flavor. Soup was green at the end. The chef asked only if we can thin it out and we did with a heavy cream.

After class I worked for a bootcamp which will take place tomorrow. Today we prepared all ingredients for tomorrow. It took us more than an hour to get everything from purchasing department. Indeed, te requisition was big, almost four pages.

In the evening one of my classmates was so kind and helped me with my persuasive essay, which is due this Friday...