spoonfuls

7 Oct 2006 at 11:50 pm

So, Jen wants more culinary stories. She can’t be the only one, and maybe it’s only fair to share something about my journey with everyone more often than three times a year.

I keep asking myself what I’ve learned here, and I always come up with blanks in the moment. I especially lack an answer when I’m put on the spot by someone. The thing about this education is that it’s not like any schooling I’ve been through before. It’s not as regulated or structured as college or high school. For math class, I could say we studied integration by parts or the Quadratic Theorem, but for culinary school, all I usually come up with is something like, “I made soup today.”

Soup, really? Well that sounds impressive. For paying approximately $200 a day in tuition, you figure my answer would be better than soup. Sometimes that’s all that was new that day, a soup.

But here’s the thing about making that soup: I learned exactly what to do at every step to make sure that soup was fantastic. The vegetables that go in must be cooked appropriately. First, the onions and leeks are sweated to bring out their natural sweetness, and it’s important to go slowly here: cooking them too quickly risks burning them and highlighting their sharper flavors.

Second, the potatoes go in. They’ve all been cut to about the same size so they cook at the same rate. You don’t want grainy texture later because some of the potatoes weren’t cooked properly. Next, stock is added. Talking about stock is its own entry, but now I know what it takes to make great stock. It’s going to be the base of this soup, so it needs great flavor, and it should be clean. The bones that went into the stock were rinsed, the fat was skimmed, and the aromatics went in near the end so they would still be present and wouldn’t have disintegrated. It will have great body because the ratio of water was correct and the proper bones were chosen.

I know to simmer the soup because boiling breaks things down and develops off flavors; slow and steady is the way to go. When the potatoes are tender, everything gets puréed. I know to think about where the soup is getting served and how to treat its finish. If it’s for fine dining, extra care and labor is justified. It will go through the bar blender pitcher by pitcher to make sure it’s smooth, and when everything has been blended, it will go through a fine mesh strainer to catch the particles that missed the blade. Maybe I’ll catch only a few teaspoons of larger particles from a pot of five gallons, but it’s those few grains that will separate a normal spoonful from a velvety one.

I know that balance is important, that the soup needs some vinegar to liven it up, to make it dance. I know that it needs a touch of cream to round it out on the palate, to fill and coat the mouth, and I know that a splash of pepper, with its bitterness and spice, will balance the salt, acidity, and richness.

I know to keep an eye on the soup during service, because the longer it sits, the more water evaporates, and with each gram of water the floats off, the saltiness becomes that much more apparent. As it loses water, the texture goes from smooth to thick. I know to keep that in mind because I won’t notice the difference over several hours while it’s busy until I realize it’s drastically different than it was initially, and I’ve been serving thick, salty soup for the past hour.

I have to keep that in mind because while I might see the soup for 30 seconds while I place it into a bowl, my customer will spoon it into his or her mouth for 10 minutes. Every spoonful will be smelled, viewed, and felt as sensuously as anything can be.

I need to make the soup so that every spoonful is interesting, from the first to the last. It shouldn’t become boring, and when it’s gone, the customer should want one more taste.

That’s what I learned today: how to make soup.