Regional Cuisine - England

Mookie did a quick turn around and presented again this
morning. Poor guy. He missed a week in Skills 3 due to an illness so he is making it up in the afternoon class right now. I wouldn't want to be him. Two presentations in one week and class from 7am until 6 pm. Mookie has moved up a few notches in my book. He even says "excuse me" now when he burps. He made a nice braised pork roast and some sauteed mushrooms. A little more action than his Sicily demo.

Chef took over and was quite animated today. It wasn't even Friday. Instead of being annoyed at my paparazzi interruptions he was encouraging me to take pictures. I think he had a bit of Sergio in him today. He began by making Welsh Rarebit. Basically a cheese fondue on top of brioche. Comfort food. I just needed some tomato soup.

He then encrusted a prime rib roast with salt and spices and put it in the oven to roast while we went in the kitchen and made Shepperd's pie, Irish lamb stew and Yorkshire pudding. I had never made any of these dishes before so it was quite a learning day for me. I especially liked the pudding, which was basically popover style muffins made with a batter that is added to the hot fat from the roast then baked. The roast was beautiful. Seemed we fed the whole school today. We did have plenty of roast beef left over for french dip sandwiches tomorrow. After all, tomorrow is France.

Goodnight.