The Student Chef

When you enter the kitchen, be in proper uniform.  Bring only your tool kit and leave your books, coats, backpacks, etc. in your car or locker.  Put your tool kit UNDER your work station, put on your apron, hat and side towel.  (You shouldn’t be wearing your apron anywhere but in the kitchen.)

Now the most important thing…WASH YOUR HANDS!  When you finish washing your hands, use the towel that you dried your hands with to wipe the sink area.  If you learn nothing else today, learn to wash your hands correctly and often.

Make sure the kitchen is setup.  If you will be using ovens, fryers, or grills, turn them on and preheat them.  Make sure the three-compartment sink is setup and that your station has a garbage can, a green bucket with washing solution and a red bucket filled with sanitizer.

Now setup your workstation.  You’ll need a green cutting board.  The yellow boards are reserved for cutting up raw poultry and the red cutting boards are for raw meat.  Use a damp paper towel to put under your cutting board to keep it from sliding on the table.

You will need only 5 tools from your kit:

1. Chef’s Knife
2. Paring Knife
3. Honing Steel
4. Peeler
5. Bench Scraper

Towels–You will need a kitchen towel (keep it neatly folded at all times) to wipe off your knife and cutting board. This is NOT a side towel.  A side towel is attached to your apron and is to remain clean and DRY and is used only protect your hands from hot pans.  

Arrange your tools neatly and keep them square to your board.  Typically, you’ll keep your chef’s knife on the right or left side of your cutting board with the sharp side facing in and your other tools at the top of your cutting board. Do not store your tools in trays or hotel pans.  Space is at a premium in working kitchens as are trays and hotel pans.  Take only one towel and be conservative in their use.  Each towel costs about .08 cents, which doesn’t sound like a lot but it adds up to around $8000 the school spends on towels every year!

Work small.

Now, gather your mise en place.  Check your recipes for the day and make a list of what ingredients and tools you’ll need.  Practice making only one trip to the refrigerator.  Gather everything you’ll need and only what you need in that one trip.  If every group needs the same ingredient, take only your group’s portion.  Don’t take all of a shared ingredient or a bottle of spices back to your station where the other groups won’t be able to find it.  If you are short on an ingredient, start a list of any additional items you need for your instructor.

At your station, refrigerate all proteins in the little refrigerators under your tables that you won’t be cooking within a few minutes. Minimize the number of mise en place containers you use.  If a recipe calls for several ingredients that will be added together, simply combine them into one container.  Do not use mixing bowls to store your ingredients in.  Mixing bowls are for mixing.

Any ingredients that are to be returned to the store room must be properly stored in appropriate containers and labeled with the date, item name, class and your initials.  The date will be today’s date if it was open from factory packaging or the original date if it was repackaged from prior use.  It isn’t necessary to label ingredients that you have temporaly stored at your station and will be using in the day’s cooking exercises.  Use the fewest possible containers, tools and appliances as possible.  Just because we have 16 tongs, doesn’t mean you should use all 16 before you decide to wash one.

You and your group are responsible for your washing your dishes and cookware.  At no time should a dish or pan be left at the sink to be washed.  Scrape and remove ALL food debris from dishes into a waste can before washing them.  Change the wash water  when it gets dirty.  Allow washed dishes and pans to air dry after sanitizing.  Put away dry dishes, cookware and cutting boards before you leave.

Clean as you go.

Keep your station, your area, your floor, your stove, your kitchen, your school clean.  Become a cleaning fanatic.  Keep your towels folded, your cutting board clean and debris off of your floor.  You can be the greatest cook but if you’re a slob, no one will want to work with you.  While you’re at it, if you have the broom and dust pan, do a quick sweep of the other  stations.  It won’t go unnoticed or unappreciated.

Braised short-ribs are one of my go-to items whether I’m cooking professionally for a crowd, producing an elegant menu item or cooking a family favorite.  Short-ribs, like many tough cuts of meat benefit from long cooking times at low temperatures, breaking down their abundant collagen into rich gelatin.  The process where collagen begins to melt and turn into gelatin begins around 160˚F.  Unfortunately, the point at which most of the collagen has melted and the point where ALL the collagen has melted is a narrow one.  If all the collagen melts, the meat will be dry. You’ll often hear people describe great braised or barbecued meats as “falling-off-the-bone-tender.”  When enough connective collagen has dissolved and meat is “falling-off-the-bone” it has gone a bit too far.  It certainly won’t survive a leftover reheat.  The desired point of perfection is expressed by the term fork-tender.  Check your braised meat early and try  to gently pull apart the meat fibers with two forks.  When you’re able to pull the meat apart with a little resistance and looking close, see some translucent fibers trying to hold the meat fibers together, you should be about there.