NE Highlights and Challenges | Week #20

This is a class assignment that I write about at the end of each week called Highlights and Challenges. If you are new to my blog I am enrolled at The Natural Epicurean Culinary Academy in Austin, Texas and this is my online journal (among other things!).

HIGHLIGHTS

1. Describe: What did you find especially exciting, interesting, inspiring, satisfying and/or fun this week in the kitchen?

This week we continued with the macrobiotic course and there were many things I enjoyed. I liked the sweet vegetable drink, several of the snacks, and guest speaker David Briscoe. 

Here is a picture of David Briscoe AKA Chef DaVeed demonstrating for us how to make a stromboli sauce. That sauce was so delicious!!!

David is a highly regarded macrobiotic counselor and teacher. I am very grateful to have met him and enjoyed a wonderful meal he made for us in class. It was an Italian themed macrobiotic feast! So good!

Here are some of the pics from class this week including the Italian recipes that were made:

2. Reflect: In what ways have you begun to apply, develop or incorporate this and/or how does this influence your professional goals?

I'd like to prepare a macro-meal plan really soon and incorporate the three main fundamentals of macro cooking into our rountine at home.

To curb any sugar cravings I think the sweet vegetable beverage will be helpful for me and my husband. 

The spring rolls we made in class was another of my favorites and now that I can roll them I can't wait to share them with others! The almond dipping sauce was really good and a nice change from the typical peanut sauce. 

CHALLENGES

3. Describe: What did you find especially challenging or difficult in the kitchen this week?

The challenging thing this week had nothing to do with macro. It was preparing for the final event and getting my recipes ready for it. I have two weeks until the event and everything right now feels like it's moving in slow motion. Kinda like the character Neo in the movie The Matrix when he is dodging bullets and everything around him is moving slow and he is moving so fast :P

4. Reflect: What might you do to meet and overcome these challenges or difficulties?

The good news is I have completed scaling, costing, and filling out a requisition form for both of my recipes!!! 

I'd like to give a special thanks to my classmate and friend Paula. She is so awesome and taught me some things that I was not aware of when scaling and costing recipes. She's very experienced and has her own restaurant in Columbia called Sana Que Sana. If you are in Bogota and want a healthy meal or a refreshing beverage go to her restaurant :)

Here is a pic of Paula in the school lab sauteing some veggies:

The other person I want to thank is Chef instructor Dianne! Yay! She has answered a lot of my questions and pointed out mistakes that I needed to correct to get me on the right path. Thanks Chef :)


That's all for now! See you next week :)

NE Highlights and Challenges | Week #19

This is a class assignment that I write about at the end of each week called Highlights and Challenges. If you are new to my blog I am enrolled at The Natural Epicurean Culinary Academy in Austin, Texas and this is my online journal (among other things!).

HIGHLIGHTS

1. Describe: What did you find especially exciting, interesting, inspiring, satisfying and/or fun this week in the kitchen?

This week was interesting and fun because I learned about sea vegetables. Yeah, sea vegetables. I never knew of this particular category and this week's macrobiotic class was really good. It felt like a long week, but for me there was a lot of good information. This is my first time learning about macrobiotics and so far so good!

I also appreciated the demonstrations given by Chef Rachel. She made so many good recipes and my favorite was the soups. The red lentil soup! I enjoyed it so much I made it Friday after school. 

Here is what the red lentil soup looked like:

The sea vegetable I liked was dulse. Chef made us dulse tacos!! Here is a photo of the taco:

Here are a few more photos of the food we made as a group:

2. Reflect: In what ways have you begun to apply, develop or incorporate this and/or how does this influence your professional goals?

As I mentioned before, I made the red lentil soup Friday after school. We've got plenty of left overs for the week so I'm happy about that. There are many other recipes that I want to try from this week's class, but I will wait since I've got a final event to get ready for. 

The other part that I might add is our knife skills. Knife skills have been highlighted for me in our macrobiotic class this week. Chef Rachel has demonstrated and requested that our cuts be uniform for even cooking and presentation. I like cutting thin diagnal pieces into matchsticks for some of our recipes we had in lab. Here is a dish that required the matchstick cuts (burdock, carrot, and lotus root kinpira recipe):

Here is our talented chef instructor Chef Rachel showing us how to roll and cut collard wraps (my friend Paula is standing next to her):

At the request of Chef Rachel, she asked us to choose one of the ten options to strengthen for our health approach to macrobiotics. The one that resonated with me is to sit down to regular meals every day.

This sounds easy to accomplish, but I have found myself standing when I'm eating a meal especially when I'm at school. When I'm home I stand in the kitchen while eating so there is room for improvement! 

CHALLENGES

3. Describe: What did you find especially challenging or difficult in the kitchen this week?

I have been slightly distracted by the final event and everything that comes with planning for it. I don't feel that the distraction is serious that it interferes with my day-to-day, but we only have three weeks left. 

This is an interesting situation to be in considering we still have to complete the macrobiotic modality on top of planning the event. 

4. Reflect: What might you do to meet and overcome these challenges or difficulties?

Some of us will be meeting after school on Monday to help each other with our costing and scaling of our recipes. I'm hoping for the best for all of us so that our event will go smoothly. I'd like for all of us to be able to be calm and happy these last few weeks :)

Thanks for stopping by and see you next week!

NE Highlights and Challenges | Week #18

This is a class assignment that I write about at the end of each week called Highlights and Challenges. If you are new to my blog I am enrolled at The Natural Epicurean Culinary Academy in Austin, Texas and this is my online journal (among other things!).

HIGHLIGHTS

1. Describe: What did you find especially exciting, interesting, inspiring, satisfying and/or fun this week in the kitchen?

Chocolates was a fun day and I also liked making coconut wrappers for our samosas! 

Here is a short video clip of some chocolates that were made and an image of the fudge brownies I made from this weeks recipes:

2. Reflect: In what ways have you begun to apply, develop or incorporate this and/or how does this influence your professional goals?

I'd like to make the fudge brownies again for my husband and friends, but I do not own a dehydrator yet. At least I have a great recipe to use when I get all the necessary equipment.

CHALLENGES

3. Describe: What did you find especially challenging or difficult in the kitchen this week?

It was a tad challenging to this week to get my assisting hours in as well as maintaining my regular class schedule on top of having a final written exam and practicum.

Even though my week was especially busy I felt good about my practicum and the written exam. Here is a pic of the sushi garden that I submitted on test day:

4. Reflect: What might you do to meet and overcome these challenges or difficulties?

The good news is I have one last public class to assist and I will be done with my assisting hours. I will have completed sixty hours next week!

With that said, I will have somewhat of a regular schedule. I'm glad I will be done so I can put focus on the macrobiotic modality that starts on Monday. Perfect timing!

NE Highlights and Challenges | Week #17

This is a class assignment that I write about at the end of each week called Highlights and Challenges. If you are new to my blog I am enrolled at The Natural Epicurean Culinary Academy in Austin, Texas and this is my online journal (among other things!).

HIGHLIGHTS

1. Describe: What did you find especially exciting, interesting, inspiring, satisfying and/or fun this week in the kitchen?

I found Kombucha, Rejuvelac, taco and burger bar, and desserts to be fun in this weeks raw class. The soups and salads we made in class were also good. 

I'm thinking that making my own Kombucha would be good although I've been thinking a lot about wheatgrass too. Wheatgrass has so many benefits for the body that I want to incorporate it into my daily routine. 

Here are some photos of the food we made this week, and I captured our raw taco bar setup on video:

2. Reflect: In what ways have you begun to apply, develop or incorporate this and/or how does this influence your professional goals?

Since this is my last week in raw, I'm planning to research dehydrators and wheatgrass juicers as well as finding a reputable person who sells organic wheatgrass. I want to establish a routine of consuming wheatgrass first before I give others any recommendations to incorporate into their diets.

CHALLENGES

3. Describe: What did you find especially challenging or difficult in the kitchen this week?

I believe that the soaking of nuts and/or seeds was something that I had to get used to when making recipes.  

4. Reflect: What might you do to meet and overcome these challenges or difficulties?

Reading recipes thouroughly (a couple of times) helps and asking lots of questions to someone who has more experience with making raw foods. 

NE Highlights and Challenges | Week #16

This is a class assignment that I write about at the end of each week called Highlights and Challenges. If you are new to my blog I am enrolled at The Natural Epicurean Culinary Academy in Austin, Texas and this is my online journal (among other things!).

HIGHLIGHTS

1. Describe: What did you find especially exciting, interesting, inspiring, satisfying and/or fun this week in the kitchen?

It was great to finally start our RAW modality. There was some theory that we covered for a couple of days and then we gradually move to some recipes. I like the sprouting we did and my 'sprout babies' did really well! I will eat them this weekend :) 

I also enjoyed the demonstrations given by Chef Dianne. She showed us how to make nut milk and it was easy and tasted great. I will have to practice some more because we will be tested on this one. 

Here is Chef Dianne working on raw cinnamon rolls for us. They were very tasty and my husband really liked them!

The other thing I liked was making battered kale chips. Homemade kale chips taste way better than the store bought kind. I made a garlic and onion version that people seemed to enjoy. I also liked making corn tortillas, but I haven't tasted those yet since the dehydration process takes a little while. We will eat the tortillas this coming week during taco day :)

Here is a recipe called Creamy Thai Coconut Soup that we made on Tuesday afternoon:

2. Reflect: In what ways have you begun to apply, develop or incorporate this and/or how does this influence your professional goals?

Well, I will need to acquire some new equipment if I want to continue with making raw recipes. A must have in raw cooking is having a dehydrator and the flex sheets that go with the trays. I already have a Vitamix and a processor so I've got some things. And it wouldn't hurt to get some more nut milk bags since I only have one.

CHALLENGES

3. Describe: What did you find especially challenging or difficult in the kitchen this week?

My timing was a little off when we were making our first round of raw recipes. You'd think I could get four recipes completed in time, but for some reason it didn't happen. I didn't make the Tamari almonds, but I'll ask Chef if I can get those in this week. 

For me, creating raw recipes is a new way to cook, but the difference is I have zero experience cooking this way. The techniques are new and I like that because it is challenging me to aquire a new set of skills.

4. Reflect: What might you do to meet and overcome these challenges or difficulties?

Practice, practice, practice! There is no doubt that I will need to practice making nut milks, rolling nori, cracking open a young Thai coconut, and keeping my knife skills current. This all so exciting and I really like the way things are going.