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Blue Plate Special
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Professionalism:

The crowning element of the uniform is the toque. A toque is the tall white hat worn by chefs almost everywhere. Although the toque traces its origins to the monasteries of the 6th century, the style worn today was worn at the end of the 19th century. Most chefs wear a six- or nine-inch-high toque, but historically, a cook’s rank in the kitchen dictated the type of hat worn. Beginners wore flat-topped calottes; cooks with more advanced skills wore low toques and the master chefs wore high toques called dodin-bouffants. Culinary lore holds that the toque’s pleats — 101 in all — represent the 101 ways its wearer can successfully prepare eggs.

Preparation:

Flavor is to food what hue is to color. It is what timbre is to music. Flavor is adjective; food is noun. Each ingredient has its own particular character, which is altered by every other ingredient it encounters. A secret ingredient is one that mysteriously improves the flavor of a dish without calling attention to itself. It is either undetectable or extremely subtle, but its presence is crucial because the dish would not be nearly as good without it.

Cooking:

To cook foods successfully, you must first understand the ways in which heat is transferred: conduction, convection and radiation. You should also understand what application of heat does to proteins, sugars, starches, water and fat in foods.

Perhaps most important, you must understand the cooking methods used to transfer heat: broiling, grilling, roasting, and baking, sautéing, pan-frying, deep-frying, poaching, simmering, boiling, braising and stewing. Each method is used for many types of food, so you will be applying one or more every time you cook. The cooking method you select gives the finished product a specific texture, appearance, aroma and flavor. A thorough understanding of the basic procedures involved in each cooking method helps you produce consistent, high-quality products.

Garde Manger:

The garde manger (pantry chef) is responsible for cold food preparations, including salads and salad dressings, cold appetizers, charcuterie items, pâtés, terrines and similar dishes. The garde manger supervises the boucher (butcher), who is responsible for butchering meats and poultry (fish and shellfish are usually fabricated by the fish station chef), as well as the chefs responsible for hors d’oeuvre and breakfast items.

Baking:

Accurate measurements are critical in the bakeshop. It is equally important to follow bakeshop formulas carefully and completely. Unlike other types of cooking, baking mistakes often cannot be discovered until the product is finished, by which time it is too late to correct them. For example, if you omit the salt when preparing a stew, the mistake can be corrected by adding salt at service time. If you omit the salt from a loaf of bread, however, the mistake cannot be corrected after the bread is baked, and its texture and flavor may be ruined. It is probably more important to follow a written formula, measure ingredients precisely and combine them accurately in the bakeshop than anywhere else in the kitchen.

To purchase ON COOKING: Techniques from Expert Chefs - Third Edition (Prentice Hall; 2003) by Sarah R. Labensky and Alan M. Hause at a 20% discount, Click Here

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