Al Di Lá Means You are Far Above Me, Very Far...

Al Di Lá, Ci Sei Tu Per Me. Per Me, Soltanto Per Me....
(Connie Francis- Al Di La)

Lesson 28- Veal Escalop à la viennoise, fresh pasta with cooked tomato concassé

We made a veal escalop today, which apparantly is the french name for Wiener Schnitzels, though we served it with pasta and chopped ingredients, instead of the salad or potatoes that one would expect in real Wiener Schnitzels. I mean even the chef said the frying style can be called a Milanese. We even serve the dish with olives and capers, which we know the French serve in Italian-esque dishes.

Then why isn't this dish not called Veal Escalop à la Milanaise? I don't know, I've given up understanding how the French thinks.

Boom

We had Chef Ju again. I'm definitely not complaining, because she's a really nice chef who gives good and friendly tips on cooking, while whipping your derrière when you mess up.

Chef Ju  had the wonderful idea of letting us work in teams and splitting up most of the work. We still had to serve our own dishes, and tenderize our own veal, but we split up responsibilities for preparing the garnishes, which we've all done before except for the fresh pasta. The end result was we finished early but still had to take ownership of our own plate.

I teamed up with So Mi, who was one of the most responsible and hard working person I've met at the school. She hand made the pasta while I made the sauce and egg garnishes (Sifted boiled egg). That's teamwork! Our dish came out really well, with only 2 comments: our sauce was not flavored enough (my responsibility, but I noticed that this is a consistent criticism that I get at Cordon Bleu. The French are just begging for more sodium) and our pasta was too soggy. I knew fresh pasta require far less time to cook than dried pasta (generally 30-45 seconds) but we must have left the pasta out for too long and the thing continued to cook with the residual moisture around it. Oh well, you live and learn. In the future, one should make the pasta as late as possible, and perhaps under cook it a bit so it could be al dente when it is served.

Quote from this class:

When the chef is explaining what cured meats are-

Student: Question, so is the meat raw or cooked?

Chef: It's raw, but salted.

Student: So we need to cook it?

Chef: No, it's salted. The salt cooks the meat.

Student: Will I get sick eating that?

Chef: No........ it's cooked

Student: But you said it is raw?

Chef: The salt cooks it.

Student: (Obviously still confused) Okay.