Day one hundred twenty three

Our fruit platter

The secret of making smoothie. 

It was easy day, except for the fact that I did sleep very bad and in the morning had a real problem to open my eyes. Right after the class I rushed to the dorm to have some sleep. 40 minutes made a huge difference, the rest of the day was not so harsh.

Today our team were responsible for fruit platters, juices, smoothies, and muesli with cured pineapple. Among the interesting dishes cooked by other teams are: crab cake with egg benedict, spinach and parmesan cheese souffle, and cinnamon rolls.

We were taught how to cut fruits and how to handle them, so the fruit plate will look great. When you cut fruits (pineapples, melons, watermelon...) it's better to use slicing knife, as it is thinner and easier to skin fruits. Also when
cut fruits, use the tip of the knife, do not try to use main part of the blade. This  will prevent pieces from sticking to the blade. When you have cut a quarter of watermelon for example, place your knife under the whole section you just cut and transfer it to the platter, then slightly push top part towards one side and the whole section will spread nicely (see the picture - watermelon here is a good example).

We made a few different smoothies for the breakfast. We made strawberry and banana, banana and peanut butter (not my cup of tea), very berry, and melon and cucumber with mint. The last one was really good and could be used not only for breakfast, but for the hot afternoon as well.

Mellon and cucumber smoothie:

1 lb 8 oz mellon (preferably honeydew), cold
1 (8 oz) english cucumber, peeled, seeded
1 cup yogurt, cold
2 tablespoon fresh mint, chopped
1-2 tablespoon sugar, or to taste
1-2 tablespoon lemon juice, or to taste
Method:
Cut the mellon and cucumber in chunk, place everything into blender and process until smooth. At the end adjust taste with sugar and lemon juice.

There is no real secret to make a good smoothie. Usually you need some milk product (milk or yogurt). You need some ingredients to be really cold, so you do need to add ice into smoothie. That can be achieved by freezing fruits and slightly defrost them. As an alternative you can refrigerate ingredients the night before making smoothie. Do not afraid to experiment, you know your taste better, what you like and what you don't. So go for it. From the practical reasons, if you do not sure what to put, do not try to fill blender completely, otherwise you will have to take some mixture out to accommodate some more ingredients.

At work today I had an opportunity to practise with watermelon for the dinner. I did not peel it, but cut and plated. Also have to cook shrimps in the evening right before the service. The shrimp were already marinated, so I had to sauté them with onion. Was not so easy due to large amount and the absence the gigantic rondo. Had to use small sauté pans (12 inch, which is small in our kitchen). Shrimps were good, cooked just right (had no time to over cook them, LOL).