TGIF ! c'est le weekend.

Thank God It's Friday. I survived the first week. And it's the weekend, finally! I can sleep in for two days. hi,hi.

here we go -

I can honestly say that we have a very nice group with lots of laughs and fun in the classroom. Even our chefs make a lot of fun with us. They're not that strict (yet).

We only sit together with the 'B group' in the demonstrations and not in the practicals, so I don't know how they are in the kitchen - but yes, all nice people.

Last Thursday after class, we had a beer in the cafe at the Rue de Vaugirard. Bit of a cheap place with the odd drunk at the bar (again, but different 'man'). Beer was good. Erich and Sean stayed long (1 am - closing time...). Sean had a bit of a difficult start today in class;

Chef noticed his little eyes and was picking on him for a while; asking him about a 'Beaujolais evening'...

In the 'B'class somebody just didn't show for the first practical, he arrived at 12 ....

Well, we did have a wine tasting of Beaujolais at the school at 6 pm yesterday evening.... but after that....

Today was a busy day, encore. After yesterday's late demo session of the @!$%%#@ puff pastry, we had to finish that today. Hate the stuff. Interesting, but I just don't like it.

And today we also had to do our own creation of a quich Lorraine. That went quite well actually. We even received compliments from our cheffie.

I ate a small part of the quiche, threw a fairly large part in the bin (sorry chef) and took half of the quiche home (probably to throw it away later...).

Then a demo about %$$#@! puff pastry again = the result / endproduct of all this work. This was a filled puff pastry with leaks and sauce. In French it sounds a lot better : Feuilleté de poireaux et oeufs pochés,sauce Albufera. yes, right!

Chef also made a Seasonal Fruit Tart with pears and grapes. This was a different dough; sweet pastry dough, a lot easier to make and handle. We didn't have to make this later in practical, but - yes you guessed right - we have to make a %$#@! puff pastry product with the stuff we have been making of the last few days. Bugger! forgot to tell you, the fruit tart was great!

Right after the demo we have the corresponding practical. We set up the 'mis en place' (that's French for 'put everything in it's place before starting the cooking) and roll out our $%%$#@! puff pastry. In the meantime we prepare the filling, reduce the sauses (2) and prepare Jayne's favourite poached egg....

The pastry went into the oven. When I took out mine it was NOT very big. It should have risen about 10 cm but mine went up (the pastry, that is...) for only 5 bloody centimeters. So something must have gone wrong somewhere. Can't be bothered. The only thing now is, is that I have a FULL pan of leak filling and a ton of sauce waiting to be poured into a tiny pastry. All this work for a minor result.

Matthew made a super puff pastry dish. I think he did one of the best doughs today.

After a check from chef, mine went straight in the bin! but it looked nice....

Chef Stril and Cristina.

The other two photographs are of Erich (finishing off his pastry dish) and Yong Soon with chef Stril plating up.

Comments from chef in his 'Franglais' accent: oui Sjoerd, ze taste is gooood, but you 'ave an-odder opportunity wiz the pâte feuilletéan wiz an-odder dish zoon'. Nice man, lovely accent.

Ze weekend: sightseeing in Paris. I think I'm going to the the Champs E. and surroundings to 'ave a look, maybe the Sunday market at Bastille again and I will definitively sleep a lot.

Sj