Beef: Meat Cookery, the Heart of any Restaurant Kitchen

This was a really fun week. All the recipes were fantastic. I got my first experience on the
grill with grilling beef tenderloin. Chef Jack taught us how to get the perfect diamond grill
markets. Rotate the meat from the 11 to the 1 o’clock position. With my first beef tenderloin I
was going for medium rare but it came off the grill closer to medium. Went back the next day
and tried it again. This time I watched the clock closer and obtained the perfect medium rare
steak. Did I mention how fun this week was?!?! Our beef stroganoff turned out fantastic. The
beef wellington, not so much. We pulled out of the oven too early. The puff pastry had not
puffed and the beef was rare to almost raw. This was a big lesson for my group members that we
need to keep in contact with each other.

I am still working on my knife cuts in Chef Jack’s kitchen every Tuesday and Friday and
it is paying off. Slow and steady I am seeing improvements. The majority of my practicing has
been in the kitchen because the cutting board we have at home is so old and jagged that I will not
use my brand new knives on it. This week I went out and bought a new cutting board for my
mom. Time to usher in a new era in that house. Now I can get in twice as much practicing.

Chef Jack brought in a steamship round and broke it down in a demo for us. It was really
interesting to watch all the work that went into breaking it down. Made me think about the cost
of labor to have someone on staff taking the time to break it down versus having a purveyor
break it down for me.

This week was a turning point for my knife cuts. Prior to this, I was working on getting
comfortable with the knife and then just chopping vegetables without any technique. February
18, 2013 was the first time I practiced knife cuts with the specifications of the practical exam in
mind.

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