Twisted...

What with exams coming up next week.... I stumbled upon a pack of white button mushrooms (they're not that easily available here!  but they have a good variety of other mushrooms) at Tops Market, and spent the whole of last night turning mushrooms, potatoes and carrots.  The mushrooms were a little soft from being bashed around in small plastic bags, but some of them were still firm enough to turn.  Some which were not... just provided opportunities to work with more difficult subjects.  If you ask me if turned veg taste any different, I'd say no, but it does make the dish a lot more pleasant to look at, and as my cuisine chef will say, food, you first taste with the eyes....

And over the past week, I turned potatoes, turnips, carrots.  I gutted, scaled, filleted (and threw away) 4 fishes.  Actually I could have sworn one of the fish was still alive: it turned around and bit me really badly when I was ripping out its gills, my hand was bleeding profusely.  Halibut, it's a very ugly fish with bad angled teeth (like a shark) much like a nastier version of sole.

Don't blame me on dumping the fishes, I'm really not hungry anymore after facing so much food the whole day (story of my life), and I've no one to cook for!  

The exams should be alright - it's a matter of getting the work flow going, and keeping organised.  They're recipes which we have already done in our weekly practicals, except this time, you work individually and cannot ask questions.  10 recipes for each pastry and cuisine have been chosen and on the actual day, we'll do a draw to see what each will end up presenting.  Cuisine is a matter of timing.  Pastries on the other hand is timing as well as precision on which way of decorating, which piping nozzle to use, etc.  That is for the practicals.  As for theory, we'll spend the last 30 mins in our second-to-last "lecture" for a written examination on topics such as food temperature, history, components, reaction of certain ingredients, etc.

Being a student all over again.  Ok fine... a more hands-on one at least!