Friday, September 9, 2011
Get creative with food!
OK all you chefs out there, you've got one more week to submit ideas for last week's mystery basket challenge. Remember, the key is to get creative using seemingly random ingredients and make a dish that would make your mom proud. Actually, as long as you're proud of it, that's all that matters. The requirements are: Use all of the ingredients to create the dish within two hours. You may not use other ingredients, but I promise you'll have enough to work with. We will be featuring the chosen dish in next week's "Smarter Chef" column, and the winner will be given credit and the title of Smartest Chef. We can't wait to hear what your brilliant minds will come up with! Here's a recap of the ingredient list: September Mystery Basket Good luck!
Friday, September 2, 2011
Test your own skills and abilitites this week.
Cooking seasonally will make your life easier as a chef, though the opposite will seem true at first. In culinary school, my favorite class was the Advanced Cooking class. During each session, my colleagues and I were broken down into groups of three or four. Every day we were given a "mystery basket" of ingredients to work with. The ingredients were infuriating at first, as they all almost went together, but not quite. As budding chefs we were expected to discern how to make them work in a single dish, and pair a beer or wine with said dish. Oh and we had to complete all of the above in an hour and a half, two hours on pairing days, having never seen the mystery basket ingredients before that moment. Easier said than done, right? Right, …
Friday, July 29, 2011
Here's the secret to travel, flexible hours and most weekends off.
Ever dreamed of cooking for a family that took you on vacation with them, say, to the Bahamas, for free? Ever wondered if there is a cooking job that doesn't require you to work nights and weekends for the rest of your life? Becoming a private or personal chef might be your answer. A private chef works with one family full time, often staying on premise to make three meals a day. A personal chef typically has several different clients that he or she might make one meal a day for. The personal chef may also make a week's worth of prepared meals at one time for the family to enjoy later at their leisure. Your responsibilities for both include grocery shopping, meal planning, execution and cleaning. You might also be asked to cook for private…
Michelle Blodget
12:34 am on Monday, September 5, 2011
Hi Sandy! I'm so excited to read your response - I too would make seared scallops, but will reveal the rest of my idea in Wednesday's column. Yes, please do submit a recipe (if you don't have time to test it that's ok, just a general idea of the cooking methods, preparation, etc. you would do). Technically no other ingredients should be used (sorry), but it sounds like you have a great, creative … more ›