Happy Halloween...and no more school!!!

Yay! Whew, I have successfully completed the Grande Diplome programme at Le Cordon Bleu. Yahoo!!! Graduation ceremony is on Friday.

I went with the pistachio crust for my sea bass, clam beignets, saute'ed black mushrooms and snow peas in a flower with petals made from fennel, and brochettes of roasted eggplant and figs with a port reduction sauce. I wasn't nervous until my metro ride to school when I had time to sit and think about what was going on.

When I arrived, there was no chef, no supplies, zippity doo-dah, so I started 15ish minutes late, as we went downstairs and get our supplies. BUT, it all turned out in the end. I finished on time, my plates were warm and my food was pretty (and it tasted good). They took a picture of it, hopefully, I'll be able to load it onto the blog.

Stefano arrives tomorrow! Ed was supposed to arrive yesterday, but I think he's out on some adventure looking for an Italian fresco trowel and he may not make it to Paris after all. Think I'll go to Isle St. Louis today and pick up the little figurines Lisa saw when she was here. Looks like it's going to rain a little.

Happy to be done with school. Be seeing you soon!

Dominique

Me looking a little dorky with my favourite pastry chef, Chef Deguinet. After we made our sculptures, we all had some champagne to celebrate! That's French champagne baby.

this is another angle. the base was actually more yellow with pink and green streaks through it.

Yeah, well, I went with the roses. it was actually prettier in person. I liked my experimental pieces more, and I guess I sold out to get a good grade : ( roses and all. you get more points for making roses...but, IT'S OVER! pastry anyway.

Octobre, or I love Paris, or won't be in Paris for long, or finals week

10/13 or so/06

October in Paris…well, it’s a little quieter here. People are starting to wear their coats and boots. Lots of scarves again. It has been in the high 60s, low 70s and pretty sun. Chestnuts are in all of the open markets now and, I’m almost done with school!

We have the ingredients for or final cuisine exam…they give us a basket of stuff and we whip up something that tastes good, looks good and is cooked to the right temperature. So, we have sea bass (which we get to filet, yahoo), 8 jumbo prawns, 500g of clams, wild mushrooms, eggplant, snow peas, fennel, tomatoes, potatoes, a red bell pepper, figs and some herbs. Wish me luck! I have a pretty good idea of what I’ll make, I’m just stuck on the eggplant.

Did my first sugar sculpture on Friday. It was a little scary, but it turned out pretty. Tomorrow we do it again and this time we make pulled sugar flowers and leaves which will be mounted on the base. I took a picture of my first effort, and I’m going to take a picture of tomorrow’s results. Hopefully you’ll be able to see some improvement.

Feeling a little blah…not sure why. Getting ready to pack up all of my stuff and leave the Paris portion of the adventure. It’s Sunday as I write this and there are a lot of people in my neighborhood. BHV is open, which is a small miracle since they are always closed on Sundays. I went to a neat cooking supply store with some cordon bleu chicks last Thursday. I have some nice new molds and a new silpat (like a non-stick place mat for working with sugar). My favorite new mold is in the shape of a pyramid (for rice, coucous, etc.).

What do you think of sea bass with a pistachio crust (reduced fumet w/ clams), glazed figs and eggplant with herbs on a skewer, snow peas and mushrooms tumbling out of a fennel “flower,” and some cute turned potatoes?

P.S. 10/26/06 I made the pistachio fish today and the brochettes in a practice practical for our final. Yay! It all turned out nicely. Now if I can do the same on Monday (in 5 minutes less time) I’ll be sitting pretty..AND..Stefano arrives November 1st!! No more blahs : )

This is my base and swirlies before I started gluing the flowers on. See the blowtorch in the corner of the photo? this is how we glue objects of a sugar nature. i got the swirly yellow piecies by pouring molten sugar into a roasting pan with granulated sugar. pretty cool huh? Sugar is pretty fun, but it's hot and can be frustrating depending on whether the day is humid or not. Your sugar will either blob (humid) or crack (not humid) depending on the weather. Wish me luck for my final tomorrow! 

flowers ("orchids") 

Ta dah! 

me with chef xavier cotte...the triangle in the foreground is Tse's sculpture. Next to me are Lani and Nina. 

This is the latest picture of me...we went on a scavenger hunt yesterday for Ashley and Lani's birthday party. Basically, ran around Paris taking pictures. Bridget and I were a team and we spent a long time on the "drinking a beer at the Great Canadian" assignment.  

Fall fruit. I couldn't help myself, but to take a picture of these beautiful grapes. They're all over the place now. The apple is a "Reine" kind of like the gravenstein with only 2 week season and doesn't keep well. the flesh is denser and it isn't as tart as a gravenstein, but Iike them.  

Groovy ERB in gay Paree. Here's daddy-o strolling along the Seine. It was nice to have them staying right across the street in an apartment of their own for a week. We ate at Le Meurice whilet they were here...beautiful.