Move-In and Orientation (Day 1)

Yesterday was move-in day. I got here around 2pm and spent the afternoon arranging my triple. Yes that's right a triple dorm, as in with 2 roommates, which is a big change from a house. Both my roommates seem cool and the dorm is decently big and with its own bathroom. We took a tour of the campus after that around 5 and then had a "meeting" where they tell you all the dumb crap about dorms for an hour but then feed you pizza at the end. I finished the night by absolutely destroying some helpless chefs in basketball at the gym which is 10 steps from my dorm for about 3 hours until my early 10:30pm bedtime.

Today was the first of a two-day orientation and we had to be at the Admissions Office at 7:45am in business casual (the required dress code for classes not in the kitchen and for most places on campus including meals). We filed in, were handed massive packets of material and then shuffled around the building for 2 hours while acquiring such things as IDs, parking passes, mailbox keys and measurements for our chef's whites (uniform for those not in the lingo). I made some friends while waiting for lunch at 11am and we walked around and chatted until lunch time.

As part of the meal plan, we are required to eat one 3-course meal every day for 6 weeks in either lunch or dinner which is made and served by second-year students in the Banquet and Catering class. As for orientation, we ate 3-course meals for both lunch and dinner. Lunch consisted of Mushroom Ragout in Puff Pastry as an appetizer, Roast Lamb with Ratatouille and Potatoes for the entree and Creme Brulee for dessert. The appetizer was excellent and I'm not a huge mushroom fan as was the two enormous slices of lamb cooked perfectly medium rare. The Creme Brulee might've been the best dessert I've ever eaten.

After lunch we listened to some lady talk about school and values and all that crap and I almost wanted to punch her. She was one of those people who asks ridiculous rhetorical questions like, "Who came here to be mediocre?" Obviously she was trying to get us hyped but after 45 minutes I wanted to kill her cause it got really old and the dumb question thing is one of my top 5 biggest pet peeves. Either way we made it through and then quickly hustled back to the dorms to put on casual clothes and do some cheesy team-building at the gym. After an hour doing cheesy and fun puzzles with my group we had a 45 lecture on alcohol and sexual harassment before dinner. Dinner was also fantastic. An appetizer of a piece of salmon over a salad of spinach with a warm-bacon vinaigrette. The entree was a strip sirloin in a red wine jus (which is sauce) that was massive with mashed potatoes, green beans and carrots... all excellent. And finally for dessert was an apple and cherry crisp. Then a few guys and I drove to Target to grab some missing stuff and now I'm writing this blog before heading to the gym again.

All in all a moderately boring and long day but filled with crazy good food. Tomorrow we have day 2 which is spent mostly sitting around and then Wednesday we start classes.

Chef Werblin

ps. I'm definitely trying out for basketball in October so I'm now on a "get fit" regiment to prep. The basketball coach said they could use some new blood... look out old scoring records cause Kobe (the skinny white one) just arrived