DON'T EAT FISH ON MONDAY

Our two class assignments Monday night were:

Filet De Sole Marguery, a Fillet of Sole in White Wine Sauce with Mussels and Shrimp. A stock and broth based cream sauce requires several reductions and a close watch under the salamander when browning the finished plate.

Filet De Bar Raye Cuit En Papillote, a Striped Bass cooked in Parchment-Paper Envelope. Aside from prepping the fish and the hand-julienned carrots, leeks, and celery, this dish can be done fairly quickly (cooking time only about 9-10 minutes) and the envelope can be impressive when torn open at the table.

For each recipe we are to prepare four servings. Each night, each group of four divides into two teams, doing two recipes each. The teams alternate dishes. For example, if Team A is starting with the Sole, Team B starts with the Papillote; then the teams flip. There is a 15-20 minute break at 8:30 for dinner so the dishes are meant to be finished by then and all stations cleaned.

The Filet De Sole Marguery, Fillet of Sole in White Wine Sauce with Mussels and Shrimp was the first dish we prepared tonight because both my teammate and I were confident about being able to bang out the papillote having done it in Level 1 and on our own individually at home.

DUE: 8:30 p.m. SERVED: 8:55 p.m.

COOKING NOTES: Flounder or Sole can be used in this dish. We tried to get a head start, miseing (mise en place, all things in divied out before cooking) but the chef said my shallots weren't thinly sliced enough (cisele...) and I ended up having to do them 3 times. We got held up prepping the fish as we had not filleted a sole since Level 1. By the time we realized the shrimp wasn't with the rest of our order in the refrigerator, the storeroom was closed (it closes for about a half hour near the beginning of class) and we had to get Chef Bobby to get it for us (camarrones means shrimp in Spanish); then they were frozen solid in a block of ice. When we finally did get everything together we realized we hadn't boiled the rice pilaf on the stove-top before cooking it in the oven for 20 minutes and we had to wait for it, throwing off the cooking times of the fish and the sauce. The rice wasn't cooked right and it ended up being pasty (though that helped the plating as the mound of rice didn't fall apart!). We also over-browned the sauce under the salamader. Our team was not on the same page; we were not both multi-tasking whenever possible and we were not communicating efficiently.

CHEF'S CRITIQUE: Our dish was late. The rice was cooked improperly and pasty. Our parsley leaves (though kept on ice) were not pretty enough and the sauce was browned too much under the salamader.

The Filet De Bar Raye Cuit En Papillote, a Striped Bass cooked in Parchment-Paper Envelope.

DUE: 10:00 p.m. SERVED: 10:20 p.m.

COOKING NOTES: The skin stays on the Bass but needs a quadrillage on the grill. Each side of the piece of fish needs a small slit through the flesh to the skin to prevent the fish from curling on itself on the grill. The paper envelope should be as big as the plate it will be served on. Before going into the oven, the edges of each envelope need to be folded and sealed with egg whites. The top of the envelope itself needs to be brushed with a little olive oil to brown the parchment paper. The three different types of julienned vegetables can be placed separately on the fish inside the envelope but don't necessarily have to be. We didn't have enough tomato concasse on which to rest the fish.

CHEF'S CRITIQUE: The dish was late. The tomato concasse was too sweet. On one of the four envelopes we prepared was over oiled.

OVERALL: Did I mention you ride the highs and lows hard in the kitchen? Our Papillote turned out to be sized better than the other team's but our first dish was late, we had to rush to get something to eat in between the dishes, and most importantly, me and my teammate were not communicating. This was one of those nights when I wondered, "can I even get a job in a kitchen peeling potatoes?"