A broke woman's blog.

In Tuesdays Food Pro I class we learned how to mince shallots and make concassee. It was so fun. Our class is not your typical class if you know what I mean. Half of our class is of younger students and the other half is of older students. It's a funny mixture. Most of us have nicknames we've given each other in the class. Like my good friend Wolverine I mean Glen! Glen is really funny and a hard worker from what I've seen. I have no idea where Derrick came up with the name of Big Red for me lol. I had to ask him if I looked like a red soda pop. He just laughed. We all have different personalities in our class. Some are quiet and some are extremely loud. When it comes to getting a job done we all pull together as one.

But anyways on to mincing shallots and making concassee! Mise en place!

You will need:

Shallot
Cutting board
Knife

1. Cut the end of the shallot and rinse it off.
2. Lay it on it's flat side and cut it a 1/8 to a 1/4 inch thick horizontally half way through the shallot.
3. Then turn the cut it towards you and cut it a 1/8 to a 1/4 inch vertically to the half way point.
4. Turn it side ways to where the cut end is facing you knife.
5. Finish cutting the shallot a 1/8 to a 1/4 inch.
6. Cut up the finished shallot until it's really fine.
7. Take your knife and turn the blade on it's side away from you.
8. Put your hand about half inch to an inch away from the spine on the blade.
9. Rub you blade over the shallot towards you until the shallot is completely minced up.
10. Now you can do whatever you want with it!


Concassee

Roma tomato
Boiling water
Ice water bath
Knife
Tongs
Cutting board

1. Turn tomato upside down and score it on the tip like a small x.
2. Put it into the boiling water for about 15 - 20 seconds.
3. Use the tongs to pull the tomato out after time is up.
4. Put it in the ice water bath for a few seconds to stop the cooking process.
5. Once out of the ice water bath pull the skin off from where you scored the tomato.
6. One the opposite end cut the plug out.
7. Turn tomato horizontally and cut it in half vertically.
8. Take out all of the seeds.
9. Turn back on side and cut it to the thickness you want it.
10. Turn the opposite way that it it's been cut and cut it that way.
11. Put it on anything you want!

That concludes our lesson today.

These are videos of my instructor Chef Douglas.

Howdy, howdy, howdy! I’m back! Well, I haven’t been gone really. I’ve been swamped with reading in my Food Production I (Douglas) and Healthy Foods/Nutrition (Blackmon) class. I love my classes. Chef Blackmon and Chef Douglas are pretty cool. We have a lot of fun in class. It’s kind of hard to be me in class because I’m trying to take my classes serious. We’ve been in school for six weeks and I really haven’t opened up. Ugh! I know, I know. There is a time and place for everything including laughter and cutting up. My ears and eyes are open in class. Wait! Sometimes they flutter when we watch the videos. Okay, okay, okay! They are pretty interesting but sometimes sitting so long makes me restless. BUT………..I have learned a lot of stuff in my Nutrition class. If you are not big on Nutrition, I suggest you go do some research on the web or go buy a Nutrition book. You will be surprised at what you learn!
So far in my Food Pro. I class we have learned how to do Juliene, Batonett, Brunoise, Small dice, dice onions, and do diagonal cuts on carrots. For the love of Marty Moose! It is hard trying to cut the way we were should how to cut. It drives me insane! I have to pretend I’m a virgin cutter. That is hard to do! It’s so funny. I’m in the kitchen and Chef Douglas will tell me to straighten my knife when I cut. The first lab we had to do Juliene, Batonett, Brunoise, and Small dice cuts on potatoes. That was terrible. He said I did good but……..Okay I did do good for my first time. I think I cut up about 40 potatoes that day! Just kidding. I did about four. Now the carrots…….that’s another subject. 1/8 inch diagonal cuts. I think I maybe have had one that was perfect. Not one carrot but one diagonal cut perfect lol. Oh well! I’m working on it. Oh well enough of my rambling. See you next blog!