Garde Manger Day 2

The second day of class I felt much more prepared. I had my recipe cards done and was ready to make some more salads! I, of course, asked to make the Caesar Salad that would be served in a tuile (pronounced twill). I say, “Of course” because the tuile is a baking item. I had a little trouble getting the tuile batter to incorporate, but so did the other teams. Chef helped me out a little in figuring out how to make it work a little better and things went better from there. Chef CJ has her Pastry class next door at the same time that I have Garde Manger, so she is popping over here and there to say hello. I was so thankful that she did so on this day because I was stressing out about the tuiles. I kept wanting to pull them out too soon. So she hung around and told me when to pull them out and helped me shape them. She is such a calming presence to me. I feel much more confident when she is around and I am thankful she was willing to help even though it wasn’t her class. Because the tuiles were so frustrating, I was even more proud of the salad in the end. I looped long strands of carrot around the tuile for decoration. I made the Caesar dressing, tossed the salad, and placed it carefully inside the tuile. I could have done more inventive garnish with it, but I just hadn’t thought that far ahead. I am working on that. One thing, though, that is being repeated over and over is that nothing on the plate should be undressed. The tomatoes on the side are dressed with salt and pepper. Even the garnishes need dressed.



Each table also made:
a Cobb Salad

a Caprese Salad (my favorite salad to order!)


a Greek Salad



a Salad Nicoise (That's tuna on that salad. He pulled out this massive, absolutely gorgeous piece of tuna. Oh my goodness, the texture of this tuna was amazing!!)



an Italian Seafood Salad


and a Warm Duck Breast Salad with Asian Spices.

Let me stop there. I had never had duck before. I really enjoyed it. I loved the mouthfeel of it and the flavors were amazing. I really would like to make this dish for Marc and see how he likes it. Natane cooked the duck perfectly.

Next week we are working on sandwiches and I have been looking up various ways to plate. I have a couple of ideas. I hope some of them work out well. We will see!