back to school

Yesterday was my first day of culinary school. After ten years of talking (or at least thinking) about doing this, I really can't believe the time has come and I'm now enrolled as a student.  The first day was really an orientation where we walked through the syllabus for the term and toured the kitchen. I got a little teary-eyed with excitement reading through some of the outings we'll be taking to places such as a winery, an oyster farm and a commercial butchery. Also, I got to see the names of some of the chefs who will be guest teachers. We will be spending three days with the one and only Jacques Pepin, one of the program's founders!

I'll give more specifics once the practical part of the program starts, but I thought I'd share a photo of the main text we'll be using. I just love the cover! It is monstrous but this is one school book I think I'll actually enjoy reading.

One quick story, we had our first cooking snafu yesterday.  Our meat vendor, Kinnealey Meat (the gold standard in the Boston area) was supposed to bring us fresh chopped veal and beef bones for us to roast to make our stocks today. Unfortunately, when we we received the delivery we discovered huge, uncut frozen meat parts. Our lead chef/teacher was not happy and called Kinnealey Meats in front of the class to ream them out! It was rather awkward to witness ("You promised me fresh meat!! Fix this or this will be the last time we do business with you!"), but I guess it was a good lesson in the kind of oh shit moment one might face working in a restaurant kitchen.