Week 1 and done!
My first week of culinary school is officially complete! TL;DR: I LOVE IT!
It really flew by — I thought I would be in pain from standing for 6 hours straight every day, but it’s so fast-paced that I barely even notice. On the first day I was so nervous that I was shaking a little bit…fortunately that has subsided. I do feel like I am on a constant adrenaline high because the of the high-pressure environment: you have to be on your game, but it’s so fun. You’re in the zone. In fact, there was one unusual moment of peace in the craziness of the kitchen on day 3 when I took a step back, observed everyone cooking around me, and almost cried because I was so happy!
Before I go into detail, there’s one huge perk of being a culinary student at ICC that I didn’t know about and which I think is important to surface immediately: the incredible free bread. There’s a bread baking course happening right now on a different floor of the building, and every day around 3:15pm a cart is rolled out with freshly baked loaves and pastries that are still warm for anyone to take. No joke, I had a croissant every single day after class let out last week, and yesterday I blacked out and ate 2/3 of a warm brioche loaf. I wasn't that hungry for lunch in the middle of the day because I was so focused, so that’s how I continue to justify the daily carby after-school snack 🙂. This bread is just beyond…and they’ll get rid of it if it’s not all used up. So, I have been taking loaves home to give to everyone I know. If you want one, hit me up!
Below, the beautiful bread cart, and the line of people waiting for it!
Read on for a detailed account of my first week
The basics
Attire: I wear full on chef’s whites, including a white jacket, baggy black and white checked pants, a white apron, a white hat, a neckerchief (yes, you read that correctly), my hair in a hairnet-contained bun, and black clogs. It’s a good look. See pics below. Somehow I manage to get super dirty every day — seemingly moreso than my classmates — so I am doing a lot of laundry.
Here I am on day 1 and day 6. You can see that the nerves have calmed!
Physical setup: There are 24 people in my class, and we each have our own station with a burner, flat top (basically a griddle), and oven, which we share with one other person. There are also shelves under each station where you can store your giant kit of knives and tools, which probably weighs 10 lbs, as well as your belongings. Each station is directly across from someone else’s, and that person ends up being your partner for the day (more about that in a minute). So, you’re always looking at someone and interacting with them while you both prep and cook. You are discouraged from talking while you work, which is good for me because I struggle to converse while focusing on not cutting or burning myself 🙂 my poor partners who try to hold a conversation!! 😂
Our kitchen classroom
Atmosphere: We’re on our feet pretty much the whole time from 9am-3pm, with a 30 minute break for lunch when we can sit, but lunch ends up finishing a little early because you need to set up your station again with your cutting board, knives, bowls, ingredients for the next recipe, etc. Whenever the chef instructor (there are two) says something to you, you respond “yes, chef” or “no, chef” — they’re mimicking a professional kitchen where that actually happens. In the room, you’re either up front watching the chef instructor demonstrate at his station, cooking at your station, or cleaning. It’s important to work with a sense of urgency — there’s always something to do. And it gets hot in there when the burners and ovens are on and people are rushing around…you’re definitely sweaty at times.
Structure: Everything is done in teams, so the person on the station across from you really matters — that person changes every day. You cook a couple recipes together over the course of the day and then bring your completed plates up to the front of the room together for the chef to taste, evaluate, and give you feedback on. There’s always feedback on how you can make your dish better. It feels like a Food Network show — rushing to complete everything at the last minute. It’s hard to remember to taste everything, which is important! Don’t forget to taste!
Below, my wonderful new friend and partner extraordinaire Blake going up with me to present a vegetable dish, and me presenting a Bechamel sauce.
My classmates: Age range is probably 18 - 45 years old. People are at various stages of their lives/careers, from just graduating from high school, to first experience after college, to 5-15 years into careers and looking to transition into food (like me). People come from all sorts of professional backgrounds including the army, business, real estate, entertainment and restaurants. I get the sense that everyone wants this to help them pivot into a career, but there may be a couple who are doing it just for fun. My class is wonderful, and I’ve already made a bunch of friends.
Homework: Every night we read a chapter from the school’s textbook that explains a number of techniques and lists out the recipes we will be covering the next day in class. You are expected to have read the chapter closely and created index cards with all your recipes on them to refer to in class. We have tests every 4-5 days, which I think makes the exam at the end of the level less overwhelming. We also have to read a food safety handbook which we will be tested on as well so that we can get certified as a safe food handler.
Focus of the week
In week 1 we focused on knife skills, including how to hold knives properly and safely. Harder than it sounds, and super important because those knives are SHARP! At least 4 people cut themselves on the first day. Luckily I was not one of them, but it’s really a matter of when and not if. By Friday, I had two small cuts on my left hand from poking myself with the tip of my chef’s knife. I am terrified of slicing off the tip of my finger so I am trying to be extra careful. One of my classmates was practicing cutting vegetables at home and cut through his nail and nail bed. He went to the emergency room and now has to take a month off and start again in the next program, which is rough.
Below, my knife / tool kit. Lots of sharp objects…lots of accidents waiting to happen.
We also worked on executing various cuts of vegetables that are integral to French cooking, a practice called taillage. All techniques are referred to by their French name, so rather than say “thinly slice” you say “émincer.” And to chop an onion or shallot finely is “ciseler,” which involves cutting a few rows in the onion crosswise before slicing it from the top down so that you get a small chop without releasing all the juices. I’m glad that I studied French for so long, otherwise I think I would struggle a bit to remember everything. There’s definitely a lot to keep track of.
In taillage, the shapes are INCREDIBLY precise. For example, there’s one shape called macédoine, where first you have to cut the vegetable into sticks (batonnets) called jardinières that are exactly 4 cm long and 1/2 cm wide, and then you cut those into perfect little cubes. Our work is assessed by our instructors, who won’t hesitate to let you know that your macédoine is 0.25 cm too big. We actually have to have rulers at our stations to make sure we are getting the dimensions right.
As far as cooking itself, we focused only on vegetables last week, with recipes such as ratatouille, a marinated beet, apple and goat cheese salad, and potatoes rissolées (pronounced ree-so-lay), which involves cutting the potatoes into this complicated shape called a cocotte, boiling them, sautéing them and THEN roasting them. They’re high maintenance but delicious. Each dish is evaluated on taste and execution, so they’re making sure you’re cutting the veg properly, cooking it to the right level of tenderness, and seasoning it appropriately.
Below, some examples of taillage. Macédoine in progress on the left (a little too big actually) and a not very beautiful cocotte on the right.
Just as exciting as the cooking, we began to touch on the farm to table element of our program with a trip to the Union Square Farmer's Market on Friday morning. We explored various farmstands to see the amazing variety of produce they have, and got to know a few of the farmers there. Whenever we cook with ingredients in class, we talk about when they are at their prime and how that impacts their flavor. It takes me back to my wonderful days at the Yale Sustainable Food Program. Some pictures of our beautiful produce finds below.
Finally, saving the best for last (slight sarcasm here), we learned about food safety and sanitation, which is not the most interesting thing we will cover, but it can make or break a professional kitchen. There were some useful pieces of information that I will use at home also, for example:
You don’t want to leave your food out for more than four hours when it’s between 41 and 135 degrees F because that’s the range in which harmful bacteria will grow and thrive — thereby making you sick
You should cool things down to 70 degrees before refrigerating them, otherwise you could spoil other things in the fridge
When you’re cooling large quantities of liquids (soups/stocks), pour them into a few different bowls to speed up the process rather than leave them in a big bowl
Assume every handle of a pot is hot and use a towel to grip appropriately. We put sauté pans in the oven so you really never know whether you’re going to grab something and sizzle your hand.
At the end of the week we had a quiz on everything we learned. I love to study, so I really enjoyed this part too 🙂 but not everyone was as happy as I was to be creating flashcards and studying again. To each her own!
A few helpful cooking tips and tricks that I picked up:
When making a vinaigrette, the oil to vinegar ratio should be 3:1. And you need to dissolve the salt into the vinegar before pouring in the oil, because otherwise it won’t incorporate. Who knew!
When boiling vegetables, the water should be as salty as the ocean. Saltier than you think — it gives them flavor from the inside out.
When peeling vegetables, peel directly over a bowl to make cleaning up the scraps easier. I’m kind of a messy cook so this is a game changer for me. My husband will be happy about this habit change!
When sautéing vegetables, make sure you don’t overcrowd the pan. Everything should fit comfortably into one layer with a little bit of space so that it browns evenly. And if you’re planning to do the tossing method when sautéing (rather than pushing things around with a spatula) then do it over an area that doesn’t have an open flame to avoid your pan — and all its contents — lighting on fire!
So that’s week 1 in a nutshell - hope you found that as interesting as I did. Always happy for thoughts and feedback. Thanks for reading!