Orientation Day 2

Today was the last day of orientation before classes. We went to the huge, awesome theater in the library to listen to 3 people spend 2 1/2 hours telling us all about a whole mess of meaningless survival skills. Finally after the torturous lecturing we broke for lunch.

Talk about eating well, this place is ridiculous. The appetizer was Melon with Prosciutto and Port Wine Gastrique (a sauce that is thick and reduced down). The sweetest cantaloupe you've ever eaten mixed with the delicious salty prosciutto and with a little of the gastrique was one of the best things I've ever eaten. The entree was a Roast Striploin (again) with Pancetta Stuffed Twice Baked Potatoes and a Vegetable Medley. All very good. And dessert was Vanilla Tapioca with Fresh Berries. Easily the best tapioca pudding I've ever had.

The afternoon was then filled with more meaningless talking except for the one chef who was hilarious is telling us about Life Through a Chef's Eyes. We had an hour break after in which I took a quick 20 min power nap to recharge. Next was a meeting with the big dog himself, President Tim Ryan (the youngest person to receive the CMC at 26... most people spend 25 years studying for it!). We did a little Q&A with him and he was very funny and interesting to talk to (plus we got him to sing).

The last part of the day was the part everyone had been looking forward to forever. Schedules, knife kits, and books. We filed in the lobby and received our things. The knife kit is insane with more tools and utensils than you could imagine and our schedules finally came so we all found out about AM and PM. For classes here you either have morning or night classes and then next semester you switch and so on. For our first 6 weeks the four classes I have, Culinary Math, Food Safety, Product Knowledge and Intro to Gastronomy are more like normal college classes instead of AM/PM. I have class everyday from 9:15-11:15am and then a break on MWF until my 4:00-6:00pm class and a break TTH until my 4:00-5:20 class. Not so bad.

After taking about a half hour to drop things off at the room we went to go have dinner which I can officially say is now the most awkward thing ever. Since other students now will be having 3 course meals as well with us, unless you are with a friend or two you get seated with 5 or 6 random strangers for an hour and a half to eat. Luckily today I knew everybody at dinner, tomorrow is another story.

Dinner was exciting and new for me. An appetizer of Split Pea Soup with Mushroom and Ham, not too bad, not my favorite soup. The entree was something I've never had, Roast Duck with a Pineapple Jus and Rice and Braised Bok Choy. The duck was good, different but good and the Bok Choy is an Asian leafy type deal that tasted like butter mostly. Finally dessert was Fresh Berries with Marscapone Cream and that was incredible. A dinner that definitely was out of my usual culinary bounds but was cool to try.

Tomorrow class starts and so I'm hitting the gym for an hour or two before I have to read some of my new textbook that has to be dragged by a rope to class its so freaking huge (1200 pages!).

Chef Werblin

ps. If you want to know what the CMC test is, its a 7-day, $5000 exam that only roughly 90 people have ever passed and you can only take and fail twice in your lifetime. If you want full details just follow this link CMC Exam.