There's no
reasonable way to game CCAP's competition, but it's possible to gain a
significant edge with just a few clever steps.
Let's take a minute
and review just a few competition tips to get you ready.
·
Determine
your plate presentations before you
arrive at finals. Keep it simple and easy,
so you'll have time to spend on organization, cooking techniques and knife
skills. Finals judges (watch for the list the week of March 19) will be all over the kitchen and stoves during
competition.
·
Have
sanitation and food handling technique down to a science. Confused about
gloves? Just remember: Uncooked food that will be cooked: no gloves needed.
Ready-to-eat (salads, garnishes, whole or cut fresh fruit) and all cooked food:
glove up!
·
Remember
to wash your hands. Often.
·
Create
a written prep list and plan to guide yourself through. Tape it to the inside top of your equipment box.
·
You
have two (2!) hours to prepare two
plated chicken dishes, and two plates of dessert crepes with sauce and garnish.
You'll want to get your practice time down to about an hour and 50 minutes, so
you have time to finish up plating.
·
In your
sauces, remember each ingredient needs to be distinct and identifiable enough
to be tasted (hint: means tarragon needs to be "taste-able," tomatoes
can't be cooked to mush, and mushrooms get a head start before garlic in your
pan).
What the cluck? (Steps to chicken chasseur)
1. Press down on the thickest part of the breast to test
doneness. Chicken should be firm
with a slight bounce back. Overcooking
dries the meat - and undercooking means the judges won't eat it. (HINT: Use a thermometer!)
2. Don't let the sauce thicken too much - it will be
gummy. If it starts to jell, thin
it with some stock.
3. Butter helps thicken the sauce, but it must be added correctly. Once you've added it, do not let your sauce boil or it will break
and look separated and curdled.
4. Make sure that sauce is balanced in flavors. There's a rich flavor from the stock
and glace, the mushrooms make it kind of earthy, there's a whisper of tomato
taste, a little hint of licorice or anise from the tarragon, a rich and soft
feel from the butter and a little zing from the parsley.
5. This is a sauce in which you also need to see the elements (except for the butter
- duh!) - means don't cook your tomatoes to invisible mush and don't mince that
tarragon to tasty and unseen dust.
6. If your pan isn't hot enough or you've put the chicken into
the pan meat side down or if the chicken skin is too damp, that chicken's gonna
want to stick to your pan.*
7. Make sure your potatoes are cooked through - throw a
couple of extra, similarly sized pieces of potato into the pot so you can test/taste
these as you cook. Make sure your
water has enough salt!
Really fancy little pancakes
Really fancy little pancakes
Seriously, that's all those crepes are:
fancy-schmancy little pancakes.
But, hey, it's dessert, so let's have a little (we said "little!") bit o' fun with them.
And you can have fun with this presentation. Remember: the crepes need to
be perfect, just a bit brown, a little lace-looking. The cream, too - yeah,
needs to be perfectly smooth and (ha-ha!)
creamy (so remember "cornstarch," not flour).
To help keep the cream creamy, drop a
piece of plastic wrap right on top of it to eliminate the "skin" that
develops when cream's exposed to air.
But folding - uh, on your own, here.
Dream up whatever you want. Just remember to practice - and time it, too.
Strawberry? Garnish away, but remember:
if it ain't in the dish, it ain't on the plate.
*A small amount of oil added to a very hot pan
almost instantly becomes very hot oil. The
oil quickly sears the outside of the food and causes water to be released from
the food.
This layer of water vapor ("steam") lifts the food atop the oil film
and keeps it from
touching the hot pan surface. If the oil is not hot enough, the steam effect
will not
occur and the food will fuse to the (too) cool pan surface.
Source:
Ask a Scientist
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