Cookie!

Friday, November 17

... as the cookie monster used to say.

Today was all about cookies... rolled, dropped, bagged, molded, icebox, bar, sheet, and different mixing techniques and textures (crisp, soft, chewy). As always, we tried to make most cookies in a healthful way, and either vegan or vegan would be possible (replacement of butter and eggs) with most of the recipes. One of our baking teachers who owned a vegan bakery cafe said that although she's not vegan it was easier to make vegan treats as this would ensure she would cover people that were lactose-intolerant (which we are told is actually a large percentage of the population and people don't realize they have it, and people don't realize they are ingesting chemicals that are given to the cows and they are being affected by this as well unless they buy organic milk) or didn't want to eat milk products, people who wanted a more low fat version, were vegan etc.

In our team, I made a chocolate cherry pecan bar, with maple and date sugars and wholewheat flour, which was very decadent and delicious. Each team also had to make a jam dot cookie using a different fat to see and taste the difference and we made ours with olive oil. Other teams used butter or coconut oil or canola oil. It didn't seem to make much of a difference in the final product except in a slight colour change. Other cookies that people made included: chocolate biscotti, rolled fig cookies, maple pecan, sesame anise biscotti, walnut tea crescents, peanut butter cookies, pecan tuiles, macaroons, and raspberry shortbread linzer cookies. Yum!

It was like a Christmas cookie exchange with all the plates of cookies lined up and people taking home an assortment of cookies at the end of the day. I have been trying not to take home many sweets but in this case it was very hard to resist.

Our teacher said she went to an interesting wine tasting event at a wine shop called Morris Brothers on 20th between Park and Broadway. There were biodynamic French wines that were produced by individual estates. While local is important, she also believes that we should not rule out French and other wines that are produced by individual estates and local means in their regions, using vitaculture and more holistic practices. The fact that they are producing the wines locally and holistically is an important consideration she believes vs. always using local producers, which we are taught. She also mentioned that we have to be more and more cautious about the term "organics" with big players like Walmart now selling organics. Walmart is buying much of their organics from places such as China and it is questionable whether it is indeed organic. Also, the large companies have been continuously lobbying the US government to bring down the standard levels for organics and now there are several levels of organic quality with a firm like Walmart coming in at the lowest level so they can label products "organics" and meet the high demand from consumers. I'll have to check out what is happening with the Canadian market when I'm back as I believe we have no enforced standards for organics and labelling and it will be really interesting what kind of "organic" products Walmarts will be selling to Canadians.

So, I forgot to mention why I am now working at Candle 79 on Thursday nights....

When I was last at Pure Food and Wine (www.purefoodandwine.com), I spoke to the head chef Neal about my love of the restaurant ambiance and food and that I would love to intern there part-time if opportunities came up. As I may have mentioned before, Pure Food and Wine is a gourmet vegan raw restaurant in Grammercy Park that was started by two chefs that were not vegan or vegetarian but tried raw food and loved it and the positive impact it had on their health and bodies. One of the chefs was Matthew Kenny, who was voted one of the top chefs in North America. Their vision was to create gourmet raw food that would be beautiful and delicious, appealing to most palates.

Yuki from my class (she has a macrobiotic and raw food cooking school in Tokyo and would like to open up an upscale raw food restaurant there) is interning there three times a week, and took me on the tour of the kitchen and introduced me to the chef. I was impressed with the kitchen as it's large with two main areas, on the main floor, with lots of open space and light. There are no kitchen facilities in the basement, just storage and very clean. I had to check this all out before interning there of course. The strange thing is to see a kitchen with no ovens or stoves, however there are lots of dehydrators in one room, which makes it toasty. It is a misperception that all raw foods are really "raw" in that the raw food movement believes that enzymes in foods are killed at temperatures over 118 degrees F and therefore foods are best eaten below this temperature.

There are several students from our school interning there and they seem to really enjoy it. Chef Neal is a graduate of our school but had other culinary schooling and lots of experience in top restaurants before joining Pure Food and Wine. And he is only 26. Yuki said one of the other chefs in the kitchen is 22 and has worked in over 10 restaurants already. This is an industry where people move around a lot and it is expected and seen as an advantage. Heh, this is the right industry for me in that aspect! Our chefs at school say that once you know how to make certain things at a restaurant, it gets boring making the same thing day after day and there is not much challenge so chefs leave. Even the most famous chefs like Ramsay, who is opening up a restaurant in NYC, develops the menu, trains the chefs and then it is a matter of replicating those dishes exactly each time. Ramsay doesn't need to be there anymore or just checks in from time to time. Therefore, there is not much room for creativity except at the higher levels of the kitchen or if you are changing your menu daily, which I hear Moosewood Restaurant does.

So, on Sunday I start interning at Pure Food and Wine and will continue interning on Thursday nights at Candle 79 (www.candlecafe.com). Two of the best gourmet vegetarian/vegan restaurants in NYC. We'll see how it goes. I have to complete a certain number of internship hours to graduate and while most students do their internships after graduation, many students do their internships part-time while attending school so they can go back home shortly after graduation. Most students at the school are from out of town and therefore want to reduce the amount of expensive rent and other high costs of living in NYC. While you can have internships anywhere in the world, they have to be approved by the school, meet certain guidelines, most of their contacts for internships have been established in NYC and of course NYC offers some of the finest restaurants in North America and the world. One of the hardest but best internships if you are serious about becoming a chef is supposed to be at a restaurant (not vegetarian) called Per Se, which is known as the one of the top restaurants in the city, a 12 million restaurant (where a fixed price menu will cost a minimum of $210 US per person) owned by chef Thomas Keller who started the Michelin three-star famous French Laundry restaurant in Napa Valley, which has been recognized by many as one of the best restaurants in the country and is almost impossible to get into. Per Se wants graduates with a 90 point average or over, perfect attendance, excellent attitude and skllls, and they are required to intern three months full-time with a minumum of 12-14 hour days under harsh supervision and strict rules. However, if you make it, this internship could open doors for aspiring chefs, but the question is whether you make it. One of our classmates said her partner did this internship and it nearly killed her. She came home in the wee hours of the morning every day, like 2 or 3 am, after a 14 hour shift, was absolutely exhausted and after her internship she didn't want to work in a restaurant as a chef anymore. And, I thought a night of scallions was bad...