Wow. Today was so intense. All of the student met in the demo room and watched Darina prepare some stocks, and also learned about some of the different types of edible salad greens. Here's a picture of the staple Ballymaloe Salad - it's made with more salad greens than I can remember, and also fresh herbs, and some flowers, and topped with a lovely fresh vinegar and oil dressing.
We got a brisk tour around the cooking school, which has felt a little overwhelming with all of the extra duties we'll have, like feeding the hens, polishing the glasses for lunch, or making the daily bread or lemonade. In the kitchen, we learned some cutting techniques and all worked together to make the dishes we learned in the demo yesterday. Sadly, I got a small nick on my finger from my gigantic chef's knife. All of the knives we've received are insanely sharp, and it seems like about a quarter of the students have cut themselves one way or another! Yikes! Here's one of the traditional Irish breads we made today - its leavened with baking soda and takes just a couple minutes to make the dough before you bake it for an hour. So simple! If only I could always eat gluten at home hah.
It was so great to finally sit down for lunch and experience the food we had made. We also made a really creamy and rich mushroom a la crème that we served over pasta. Wow. What a treat! The demonstration for what we will be making tomorrow followed right after lunch - and boy, we are really going to be cooking tomorrow! This is some of the things we'll be learning in pictures...
Right after the demo, we finally got to tour the farm! They have such a wonderful garden that is over 200 years old and once owned by a Quaker family. There are these huge hedges grown to separate the different garden that look exactly like the hedges in the 4th Harry Potter maze! We also got a tour of their 1 acre, completely organic greenhouse. It's incredible just how many different vegetables and herbs they are able to grow in such a small place. It's very inspiring to me. Here are some of the pictures I took!
The woman in the picture is the head chef named Darina Allen, by the way.
For the rest of the day (which wasn't very long because we finished up this whirlwind of a day at 7:00 pm or so!), I worked on organizing my binders with some of the other students. Apparently if we don't stay proactive, we'll get swamped with unorganized recipes! Again, it's been such a blast getting to know all of the people here! Everyone is so nice really easy to approach and start a random conversation with :). Tomorrow is when the independent cooking starts!
Until tomorrow,
Livvy
For the rest of the day (which wasn't very long because we finished up this whirlwind of a day at 7:00 pm or so!), I worked on organizing my binders with some of the other students. Apparently if we don't stay proactive, we'll get swamped with unorganized recipes! Again, it's been such a blast getting to know all of the people here! Everyone is so nice really easy to approach and start a random conversation with :). Tomorrow is when the independent cooking starts!
Until tomorrow,
Livvy