Why, fancy meeting you here. It has been far too long since our last meeting and I deeply apologize for the delay, again ;P Enough with the formalities, let's get down to the nitty gritty! After looking at my last blog I realized, IT HAS BEEN OVER A MONTH SINCE I'VE UPDATED! I'm not implying that I should be writing everyday, but I do owe it to my friends, and especially my family to be doing this more often. I really should be able to keep up on the weekends, but I don't think you all realize what kind of time warp you get stuck in here. I mean, it literally feels like yesterday was April 20th and then, BAM! It's freaking June!
   I have to apologize in advance for what is to come, if you read this Chef, I'm sorry but it must be said. The last few weeks, save this last Wednesday because we had an amazing substitute, have been utterly ridiculous. The insanity the ensued in the bakeshop was completely unnecessary. I am here to learn, plain and simple. With that being said, how can I learn when someone is constantly temperamental? GREAT question, right? Answer: I CAN'T! The purpose of a fundamentals class is to well, learn the fundamentals of whatever you're studying. I can say with the most sincerity that I have never, ever encountered an instructor who is so bothered by my classes quest for knowledge by asking clarifying questions. I am looking forward to the day when I no longer have to step into the daily suffocating, uncertain realm of Chef; so close I can taste it.
   Incredibly liberating to get that off my chest! Now onto the good stuff! I know I mostly talk about school on here and never much about my personal life, partly because I'm lazy but, mostly because I don't find it too interesting. I also realize not everyone enjoys, or cares, reading about mushy things but I really want to share a part of my life in a more intimate setting than Facebook. I apologize for the following gush-fest.
  So, I've been dating the most amazing guy for the past six months. His name is Greg and he is awesome. We've actually known each other for over six years and, quite honestly, I never imagined that our high school friendship would lead us here. I am so glad it did :] He is quirky, hilarious and incredibly cheesy when it comes to telling jokes :P This last weekend I went down to visit him and he surprised me by planning an entire day of things for us to do. Sounds pretty normal to most, but I'm definitely not used to anything like that. We went to the movies, had a picnic,went shopping in some kitchen stores, went to a restaurant that was pretty far away because he remembered when I told him about a specific beer that I loved that tasted like a blueberry muffin and drove me all the way there to get one, and finally to an awesome ice cream parlor that had the most amazing salted caramel ice cream. It was a wonderful day, and I wouldn't want to have spent it any other way <3

He's probably not going to like that I posted this buuuuut....

Quite dapper, if I may say so myself :P
Just thought I would include a visual for those who like pictures :D

So anyway, school has been hectic as usual and I'm really looking forward to breathing this weekend. I suppose I should check out for now considering I should get some rest before my two finals tomorrow. Thank you all for taking the time to peruse the update!

I miss you mom, I miss you dad
I miss the four sisters I have
You're in my thoughts throughout the day
And I can't wait to see you again
(cheesy I know, but I can live with it)

Until our next encounter,
Keep it Short & Sweet

Hello world!


Sorry that I've been neglecting to update frequently, time has flown away from me and I cannot believe I've been here for seven weeks! It's strange that life can rapidly change in such a short amount of time.

Okay, it's been about three weeks since I've actually posted anything, so this one is going to be a long one. Also, I've moved the blog archive to the right side so now you can click the links to view a particular post instead of scrolling through all of them :]

Alright, so the Wednesday before Easter I went to check out the Baking & Pastry Society club meeting to see what it was about and I heard about making some Easter bread and of course I didn't want to miss out ;] Little did I know I would be creating this awesomeness...

Why yes, this a bunny made out of sweet bread. It was really simple to make and a lot of fun! They're so freaking cute so how could you not want one?! Sadly, I forgot to take a picture of the final baked product but you'll be happy to know it was delicious all the way down to the little cotton tail ;P

In class the day before I made pâte à choux (pot-uh-shoe) which is a pastry that is used to make things like éclairs , profiteroles, croquembouche and St. Honore (you can click the words to see what they are) which all are absolutely amazing. I have to say, so far pâte à choux has been my favorite :]

Something different about the CIA is every three weeks there is a new class group starting and a class group graduating. When graduation happens there is a Grand Buffet which showcases products that the graduating class has made which you are also allowed to eat. While it may not be anything new to you, I've never seen anything like it before. It was like telling a kid in the candy store they can have anything and as much as they want, and that's pretty much what I did :]

    Now the room may look small but don't let the pictures fool you.

Just a few I tried... 

                               

...and they kept bringing out more!

It was fun and thankfully we have a gym that is amply equipped to help you burn off all of the baked sweet deliciousness :]

In bakeshop we've made quite a few different items in the last three weeks. Let's see, we've baked éclairs, lady fingers, genoise, roulade, angel food cake, jalousie, palmiers, and apple strip (again, you can click the words to see what they look like). Our skills verification test is coming up in two weeks and I'm starting to panic a little lol. I know for some this is going to be a piece of cake but I know for sure I'm going to need some practice. I guess that goes for anything you want to excel in, the more time and effort you put into something the better you will be and it will also reflect in your work.

On another note, the school is absolutely gorgeous in the warm spring, which happens to be my favorite season <3 When you walk out those front doors you can smell the beautiful purple draping flowers on the breeze as the sun gently glows and warms your skin, it's so incredibly refreshing <3

Aside from all of that, I got a neato letter in the mail yesterday :] 

As you can see, my little sister is graduating! She's probably not going to be too happy that I put her pictures up but I just had to let the world know how very happy it made me to get this in the mail :] It's tough being 3,000 miles from my family and four sisters and I wish I could be there in June to see her graduate. I hope you aren't too upset Hannah, I love you! :] 

Well, I suppose I will end the post here and I apologize for how lengthy it is. 

Until next time, 

Keep it Short & Sweet

Helloooooooo! 

Wow it's been almost two weeks, I didn't realize that I waited so long to make another post! A ton has happened since then. Let's start with the goodies ;D Each day that I have Bakeshop Fundamentals, which is two days a week, we bake something new. Four bakeshop classes have passed since then so we'll start with March 20th.

The corn muffins were the best I have ever tasted. Now I know the banana bread looks burned but I promise you it's not :] 

March 21st

Apricot and raspberry coffee cake, Yum!

 Aaaaand blueberry muffins. A few are attacking each other. This happened because the fans in the convection oven kept blowing air around because people kept opening and closing the oven door.

March 24th I went to Niagara Falls! :D It rained the whole time -__-

March 27th we baked biscuits. I never really liked biscuits because they're usually dry, flavorless and just yucky. But let me tell you, these were the best freaking biscuits I've ever tasted. 

March 28th Pies and Scones!

Blueberry, Apple, and Cherry :D

Pecan

Chocolate and hazelnut scones

So yup, that's what I've been up to besides tests and lots of reading and homework.

I'll update again soon!

Short & Sweet

This post is a little later than I would have liked but oh well :] I had a few classes but my favorite was my Baking and Pastry Techniques class where we started with a basic chocolate chip cookie and a sugar cookie. I didn't take any pictures of the sugar because I like chocolate chip better ;P Thanks to my partner Lauren ours turned out awesome!

Before baking.

3/15/2012

 After baking. They were so yummy!

So I bet you are wondering what my uniform looks like. This is what my chef whites(the white chef coats) look like. The Gold embroidery indicates a Baking and Pastry major. The Culinary majors have green embroidery, lucky :P

I don't have pictures of the rest but I'm sure some pictures will surface of me in my full uniform, maybe even in my toque(that tall white hat that chefs wear).

This is me and my roommate, Nursu. She is from Turkey and is pretty awesome. In this picture we're eating Rita's Gelati, Italian Ice with custard ice cream. We both got coconut cream ice with chocolate custard. Soooooo good! And it was beautiful outside too :]

3/17/2012

And tonight Nursu and her friend Reyyan made some yummy Turkish dinner! 

Acem(Ah-jem) Pilaf is the rice dish on the right and Tas(Toss) Kebab is the on the left.

This last week went by so quickly with all the homework and classes. Before I know it I'll be leaving on my extern! I'm having a great time getting to know new people and learn new things but I miss home a lot too. I miss all of you a lot. This week in my kitchen class we're going to bake muffins and I'm really looking forward to it! Mmmmmmm, blueberry muffins! Okay, time for me to get back to studying. 

Short & Sweet

Okay, so first full bakeshop day, 1:45pm-8:30pm, and I'm still alive! Yay! We had chocolate chip cookie demo done by Chef, then started our own dough which we get to bake tomorrow :] We're also going to do sugar cookies tomorrow, yum! We did a bunch of other stuff today too but it all kind of melded together since I really only wanted to make some friggin' chocolate chip cookie dough, haha! So you know how when you watch someone demonstrate something like how to cook steak or decorate cupcakes and it goes a little something like this?

Yeeeeaaaahhhhh, pretty much how I felt today when I was trying to make a mini pastry bag to practice my piping...and when I was practicing my piping homework. That's what practicing is for though, right? So after practicing and redoing it and doing some laundry and getting distracted by the Ben and Jerry's in my freezer(which was pretty much a milkshake because my "freezer" is a poop face and doesn't want me to enjoy real ice cream) and then practicing again, I came out with something pretty decent, yay! ^__^

The white butter-cream is supposed to be rosettes, supposed to be :P

The brown is a loop filigree

Anyway, that's all I have for today.

Goodnight!

Short & Sweet

No classes today so not much going on. But here is a picture of my tools!

And here is my lunch:

Mushroom and sausage risotto appetizer

Breaded salmon with I think a raspberry balsamic sauce then some horseradish mashed potatoes and cooked spinach. It was very yummy :]

Sadly I forgot to take a picture of dessert which was a mini cheesecake with a raspberry sauce and a dollop of whipped cream. Mmmmmmmm!

I'm not sure that any of you really find what I'm eating for lunch to be that interesting, so give me some feedback on what you would like to see :] Also, I'm going to just be starting official classes tomorrow and will hopefully have more pictures of what that is like. So yeah, feedback, do it.

Short and Sweet 

Hello again!


Today was last day, day four, of orientation type stuff. We're gonna actually do something in the kitchen next week, yay! Also, I got my tool kit today! Yessssssss! Knives, spatulas and all sorts of neato baking tools :D I'll take a picture when I get it all arranged nicely. I'm going to make this post  mostly pictures, enjoy!

This is the main building, Roth Hall. I took this right outside of my dorm building, Pick/Herndon.

Front view

\

Extension of Roth Hall

View of the Hudson River from the front of Roth Hall. Hudson Hall Dorms on the left.

The Colavita Center for Italian Food and Wine. Also has the Ristorante Caterina de' Medici.

Conrad N. Hilton Library which is the second largest library of culinary works, 

the first is the Library Congress.

Inside the library are over a hundred of famous chef's hand-prints who have visited the CIA. These particular hand-prints belong to Julia Child :]

Today's lunch = YUM! Especially the mini chorizo quiche.

Inside my main classroom for the next 15 weeks, Bakeshop II

Dinner today: Oxtail with cooked spinach and I believe it was a chickpea puree. So freaking good *drools*

Well that's it for today!

Short & Sweet