Day one hundred sixteen

Today's plate

What is a perfection?

The last day of A la carte cooking class. That was the shortest class so far, only eleven days of cooking (also arguing and fighting in the kitchen). In spite of the short time, I feel that the knowledge we receive  in this class exceed greatly what we got from the previous one. Tomorrow it will be written exam for me and on Wednesday is practical.

Today our menu was:
Grilled Mahi Mahi with Pineapple Salsa
Basmati Rice Pilaf
Sautéed Spinach
Grilled Vegetables
Chicken Consomme
Seasonal Salad with Sun-Dried Tomato Vinaigrette.

I was responsible for the grilling fish and the rice pilaf. What I found out today, it that we had a plenty of time. Indeed, I had an extra hour. It was too early
to start rice pilaf and I was not able to anything with the fish because we were waiting for the fish to arrive. Finally, around 9:30 we have got the fish. There were two fillet (two sides) approximately 10 pounds in total. The chef said that now it considered  a small fish. 20 years ago that was a baby fish, the small fish (mahi mahi) was around 40 pounds...

All what I have to do to fabricate the fish is to remove skin, remove some bones (it has interesting structure with a bones in the middle of each fillet), portion the fish for 5-6 ounces portions. That was an easy task. Then all portions were brushed with olive oil and seasoned (salt and pepper). I grilled them probably for 6 minutes - 4 minutes on the presentation side and 2 minutes on the other side, to get a nice grill marks. Later fish were finished in the oven, to the internal temperature of 148 F. At the tasting our chef said: 'It could not be better than this'. The fish was really great, it was soft and not dry at all.

Rice pilaf was also good. I slightly decreased the amount of chicken stock and used bay leaf, thyme, and cloves as aromatic. It was how it suppose to be: fluffy, with grains of rice intact (not broken), and nice flavour.

Finally, at the last day we were able again to produce great food as a team.

Here is a link for the recipe for Pineapple Jicama Salsa