Day 25

Since we had the test yesterday, today is a sort of anti-climax. We simply worked in the kitchen for the students' lunch.

Day 24

Today is test day.

The practical features 2 simple dishes we've done before - the stewed chicken with chestnuts and deep fried dory fish.

I brought my thermometer for the deep fry. But our chef reminded me that the probe is not where the fish is (the tip is deep in oil while the fish tended to float). So visual cues on the frying is still vital to determine if the oil is hot enough. Nevertheless, the thermometer was useful as a relative gauge of the heat of the oil.

Our class photo

Day 23

Half the class  having their practical assessment. My half of the class is doing OJT (on the job training), where basically we get to help out in the main kitchen catering to the school lunch (prob 100+ students, not counting those who have their own product to consume).

It was rather relaxing and fun actually. Just follow instructions from the chef and do prep etc. I also got to operate the oven for the chicken (today's lunch was Nasi Lemak).

Day 20-22

Putting 3 days worth of post into one. Not much worth reporting that isn't basically a repeat. 

Day 20 was Chinese (steamed cold chicken, stewed chicken with chestnuts, braised mushrooms), day 21 was Malaysian/Nonya (sayur lodeh, assam fish, chicken curry), and day 22 was Singapore (cantonese style steamed fish, bubur cha cha, stewed chicken with fermented bean paste).

Day 19

Today is Indian moist heat. Did pulao (rice), fish curry and Aloo Gobi.

Day 18

Today was Thai Moist Heat lesson. We did a cabbage wrapped roll (not too bad if we have less cabbage and more filling - the chef later told me with more skilled cooks, they'd cut out the stem altogether and wrap more thin), a Thai style otah, and a pumpkin pudding. The meatball soup is just our leftover filling made into a soup.

Day 17

Today was Western "moist heat". We did a beef goulash, poached salmon, boiled potatoes, brocolli.

All rather uninteresting to me.

But the chef did give us a chance to do some basic skills as extras. Like poached eggs and hollandaise sauce.

I passed on the poached eggs and tried hollandaise. Was a success, but someone threw it out by mistake! Hollandaise is supposed to be chancy to do.

I later found a idiot proof method. And I tried it out - it works.

foolproof-2-minute-hollandaise-recipe

http://jmfoodie.blogspot.sg/2014/12/no-skill-needed-hollandaise.html

Day 16

My left thumb is officially cramped.

This from trying to move the wok around in our chinese dry heat lesson. 

The only dish we did was yang chow fried rice!! No photos - who has time!?

We were trying to emulate this : https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=NHRudxFOvcg

Our instructor is a lady who barely is taller than my chin. 

I managed to make it all the way through but I spilled some and not much wok hei on mine. My thumb still feels not normal from gripping the wok handle and trying to toss the rice.

The wok is scary hot. One moment inattention at high heat is enough to burn something.

Day 15

Today was Thai.

We did pineapple fried rice, baked (grilled) salt coated Tilapia, and deep fried pandan chicken.

Some points.

1. Many restaurants tend to use lime juice from bottle. Fresh pressed lime juice is better.
2. birds eye chilli, garlic, coriander roots, lime juice, fish sauce and sugar is a good basic chili sauce. Minus the coriander root, it can be used for salad dressing for example.
3. Pineapple rice originally only has curry powder. But due to diluting influences, it now tends to have more tumeric.
4. Original Thai cooking uses less oil than Chinese (but now a lot of thai cooking is diluted by Chinese influence). In some Thai homes, they squeeze the coconut oil from coconut and just use that.
5. Always balance sweet, sour, salty. Taste, taste, taste. Spice/heat is actually not all that important.
6. Actually, fried rice does not need overnight chilled rice - chef said that is a recipe from people who don't know their rice. Actually, the rice just needs to be cooked properly - the most important being the amount of water. She advises we just always consistently buy one type of rice and get the amount of  water right. Also old rice is different from new rice.
7. When frying rice, stir it or press down lightly. Do not cut with the edge of the spatula. 
8. The stuffed fish (stuffed with saltless oyster sauce, lemon grass and kaffir lime leaves) was interesting. To stuff the fish, you go in through the gills so that there are no holes created.
1. Using a scissors, cut the ends of the gills. Remove carefully.
2. Then reach into the gill cavity, and using fingers, hook down toward the stomach.
3. After some fishing around, you should be able to remove all the fish innards.
4. wash the cavity, then stuff.

Day 14

Today was Malay Food. The chicken was fried, then added a sambal paste we made, and then finished in the oven.

The veg again had a paste and stir fried with long beans, tempeh, and a bunch of stuff.

The last is Tauhu goreng.

Day 13

Today was Indian food (dry heat), using the Tandoor Oven. 2 types of bread, 1 tandoori chicken. The chef instructor also cooked us a lentil stew (not in instruction) to complete the meal. A tandoor oven in full steam is 500C in temp.

It was actually really quite relaxed. Partly because I think the oven is a dangerous piece of equipment so the chef instructor paced us through it deliberately. Quite fun - I got to clean the (really) hot oven surfaces with a wet towel, shape bread dough, slap the bread in the oven, extract the bread, and do the chicken tandoor.

By the way, our chef instructor is an Indian Chinese!! By that, I mean that he is a Chinese by race, but he was brought up in Calcutta Chinatown (yes there is a Chinatown every where). It sounds slightly weird to hear Indian style English coming from his mouth.

Got a lot of photos today, because the class created a whatsapp group.

Here's a bunch of today's photos (a few are captioned).

A view inside the tandoor. Up to 500C at full operation.

soak the cloth in salted water and then reach into the oven to clean the sides (charred bits of food on the side will cause the bread not to stick so have to clean). heh I was the only student trying this out. Later the instructor showed a better way by lengthening the towel and then whirling it from just above the oven and scraping the sides by that action.

This is the "bread pan" used to apply the dough to the side of the oven.

Some a reddish due to more chili powder added.

Trying to shape the dough right.

sadly some of our naans dropped on the floor of the oven - due to improper application of the bread (in some cases due to skittish hands from people fearing the heat - it really is quite hot).

Our 2 youngest classmates.

Uh... my thumb?

eating our own product.