THE MAY CAKE MASSACRE

I'd been feeling pretty good overall coming into my last week before the midterm until, duh, duh, DUH...yesterday's May Cake Massacre. We decided to do a possible midterm combination, a fish (poissonier) and pastry (patisserie) pairing of Filet of Sole in White Wine Sauce with Mussels and Shrimp (Filet De Sole Marguery) followed by a white French cake (Genoise) with apricot brandy. While I've disapproved of the fish stock based cream sauce, it's (ahem) starting to actually sound tasty.

DISH: Filet De Sole Marguery, Filet of Sole in White Wine Sauce with Mussels and Shrimp

DUE: 8:00 p.m. SERVED: 8:04 p.m.

COOKING NOTES: It's one of our more complicated dishes. Sole, filleted in four pieces, is kept chilled while the fish bones are used to make a stock. Shrimp shells, shallots, butter, wine and mussles are cooked, the sand removed (decanted) the broth reserved. The fish is then cooked in a mix of fish broth (fumet), mussel broth, and wine with shrimp. The fish is put on a plate with some mussels and halved shrimp (butterflied). The liquid in which the fish was cooked is reduced, some heavy cream is reduced and added to it and finally, some whipped heavy cream is mixed in. The final liquid covers the mussels, shrimp and fish and browned under a salamander (broiler).

Not completely memorized yet, but the dish turned out very well and would have been on time had there not been a backlog at the salamander where another groups four plates were being browned. The rice was a disaster, unseasoned and overmoistened. I forgot to use chicken stock instead of water and tried adding the chicken stock after the rice was already half-done in the oven. The result? A clumpy mess--something you'd use for rice pudding not dinner.

CHEF'S CRITIQUE: The rice was horrible. If your rice ends up like that don't serve it. Chef B. asked us to do the rice again. I did but my first Genoise went in the oven at the same time and I misstimed things and couldn't open the oven lest the cake fall and the rice was overcooked and chewy. I also forgot to season it again. SEASON THE RICE!

DISH: Genoise Abricotine A La Creme Anglaise, White Sponge Cake with Apricot Brandy and Vanilla Custard Sauce

DUE: 9:30 p.m. SERVED: UNFINISHED

COOKING NOTES: I'd made the genoise in Level 1 and it was lovely-- tall and light. I'd made the genoise once in Level 2, no problem. I'd made the genoise at home, twice, as part of a four layer peanut butter and chocolate cake with peanut frosting and chocolate liqueu, no problem. Those three successes were down-payments for the misery I experienced Wednesday night when I made this cake three times in an hour and had two failures before finally achieving a very late, but very tall and beautiful cake.

The most discouraging thing is I'm not sure what the problem was. I used cake flour each time (though I'd used regular flour without any problems before), and twice whisked the three eggs and 75g of sugar over a bain-marie until the temperature was over 120 degrees and my arm felt like it was going to fall off. I was ready to give up when Chef B. suggested I try one more time, this time using the full five eggs suggested in the book (the 3 egg version is Chef M.'s). Now everyone else in my group used three eggs and their cakes didn't fall. That's fine but from here on out, I'm a five-egg genoise kind of guy. The cake was two inches tall. I didn't have time to slice it, brush it with syrup and jam, cover it with toasted almond slices and place it on the vanilla custard sauce (creme anglaise) but it was a relief to have made the cake. I'd show it to you but I left it family station to pick up on my way out after changing but someone had grabbed it before I got down there!

CHEF'S CRITIQUE: The creme anglaise shouldn't be cooked on a bain-marie when it's returned to the heat. I won't do it again but I'm still not sure what the difference is in this case between using the direct heat or the removed heat and the removed heat (the double-boiler, a pot with a little boiling water below a metal bowl with the sauce being mixed in it) but my reasoning was that it would have been a slower heat which would have given me a little leeway while finishing up the fish dish.

Go slowly, do the genoise right and give it a little love.

OVERALL: It was dispiriting to have such trouble with the cake and a relief that the third one worked out. I was pretty quiet for the second half of the night and I could tell my teammates were pulling for me. At one point, they thought the second failed cake which I abandoned in the oven was the third one and decided not to say anything about it. What do I take away from this? While it's a worst-case scenario, you can in fact get at least two go-rounds with this cake in a short amount of time if you're in a jam. If I get it on the midterm I'll be giving it a little love, and saying a little prayer.

WINE TASTING: We tasted A Pascal Jolibot Sancerre 2003 and 2004 which I wasn't crazy about until I tasted the Cambria 2003 Chardonnay. I'm not crazy about the oakiness of Chardonnay. One of the students suggested it would be paired well with a cream sauce so I'll have to give that a shot but for now the Chardonnay has me running back to the Sancerre and Pinot Grigio.