Cleaning Out Of Boredom

This morning I got to work early again, and first thing first – I put away the produce order into the walk-in. I was told to do this in a very specific order by a very particular cook, not that I didn’t already know where everything belongs. While I was in the process, I also organized the entire fridge. Then I prepared some champ potatoes for tonight’s service.

Next I was put to work with the breakfast chef, who needed help because he needed to prepare for forty afternoon tea ceremonies the following day, and there wasn’t a lot of wedding prep left to do anyway. First I made the chocolate-dipped éclairs, something I have made several times before. But this time I was slightly frustrated by what the cook was telling me. First of all, the cream wasn’t whipped stiff enough to not ooze out of the éclair shells. Second of all, he told me the chocolate was not melted long enough, when indeed, it was shiny and smooth and liquidy enough. He heated it in the microwave for longer, then longer again, then ended up with a solid chocolate lump – the result when chocolate overheats. I didn’t want to argue with him, but I knew this would happen. This is basic chocolate-melting procedure. Then I had to start with new chocolate again.

chocolate-dipped éclairs

Next I gathered the remaining items for afternoon tea, and prepped the ingredients for the finger sandwiches, which would be made fresh tomorrow. This didn’t take very long, and then I was told to scrub down the kitchen. This is something I used to do when I worked in a commercial bakery – basically just spray every stainless steel surface with sanitizer and wipe it clean. There are quite a lot of stainless steel surfaces in industrial kitchens – walls, counter tops, fridges, ovens, stoves, hot boxes, etc. Then I busied myself with other cleaning jobs – cleaning out the fridges, and relabelling items which did not have labels or did not have correct labelling, checking all to see if they were still good. I busied myself with other cleaning jobs – the freezer, the dry storage room, the middle kitchen, etc. Basically at this point there was nothing left to do, but no more work to do at the marquee either, so I was doing what chefs do during down time and cleaning every visible surface. Boring and tiresome, yes, but completely necessary!

One of the cooks brought back some items from the marquee to vacpac, label, and freeze, so I did that and cleaned up. Then one of the servers asked me for gluten free cookies, as the arrival reception was serving shortbreads and they didn’t have a gluten-free option. So I prepared them, then headed over to the marquee for service. Service went slowly, because there was a long wait between each course before the plates were cleared. We were literally only waiting on the bride to finish for a good fifteen minutes between the main course and dessert, while every other guest was anxiously waiting for dessert.

Tonight’s menu was as follows:
Canapés: Shortbread Cookies, tea and coffee
Starter: Salad of Tomato and Mozzarella, basil pesto, balsamic dressing
Bread: Wheat bread, white rolls, multigrain rolls, bacon onion rolls, raisin walnut rolls, tomato fennel rolls
Soup:  Cream of Celeriac with Smoked Bacon, Truffle Oil
Sorbet: Green Apple and Pear
Main Course Option #1 – Chicken: Local Breast of Roast Chicken, Champ Potatoes, Wild Herb Stuffing, Chasseur Sauce
Main Course Option #2 – Fish: Grilled Salmon, salad of fennel marinated in lemon, baby spinach, vierge dressing
Side Dishes: Roast Baby Potatoes, and Roast carrots, onions, parsnip, and turnip.
Dessert: Warm Apple and Berry Crumble, Vanilla Ice Cream
Petit Fours: madeleines, cranberry white fudge, fruit jellies, flaked white chocolate truffles, Belgian dark chocolate truffles
Evening Buffet: Bacon Butties, wedding cake