Father Feeds Flock!!!

For school I'm writing a research paper on the cuisine of the pacific  northwest.  After reliving so many memories from my first 13 years of life, spent in the Seattle area, I was inspired to cook food from that region. I have a Washington State cookbook, and I got this recipe from it. Roasted Mushroom Bruschetta. First I took shitake, crimini and oyster mushrooms and chopped them. I added parsley, onions, garlic and olive oil and roasted the mixture. I went rougue a bit and choose glazed carrots for the veg. I'm not sure this the best veg representative from the PNW, but I like em. Homemade chicken stock, sugar, carrots and a sprig of rosemary. Reduce until the stock is thickened. I wanted to include some type of a sauce that contained crab. I was thinking butter, dill and crab, but I found this recipe online and altered  it a bit.  Melt butter, add flour to make a roux. add milk and crab and parmesan cheese (rec...

Since we work in groups, I don't cook every dish for any meal. However, for the most part, I cooked or helped with the food contained in these photos. I normally only take photos of "my" food. Its part of our grade to document what we do for our journals. My table the night we got the highest grade in the class. Thats me on the left! Cheese enchiladas, refried beans, pico de gallo and flan I forget the name, but this is a mexican beef soup shrimp cheviche mufaletta fried shrimp po boy I think this is jumbalya bread pudding with whiskey sauce pralines banana pudding with meringue  clams casino thumbs up from table 3 corn chowder I call it the plumber crack carrot i still need some practice on my tournee,  but not too bad for my second attempt winter vegetable soup tomato duxelle roast beef, tomato duxell, brocolli hollandaise and...

The other week in culinary school... wait, have I mentioned that I'm in culinary school? Maybe so. Thats me on the left. Anyway, the other week we made pralines.  I had never made these before, and I was surprised at how easy they are. Just a little chemistry, and viola!  Candy! The trick is to obtain "softball stage", I'm not even sure what that means, but it is 242 degrees. Using my brand new candy thermometer, I achieved this. They were soft, chewy and delicious. Father Willy Wonka-ed up some dessert for the flock!