My Body Hates Me

So this is how my day goes until next Tuesday... 4:15 alarm goes off, get up and ready for class, in class at 5am until 11am, quick lunch, shower for 20 minutes to stop smelling like fish, nap until 4pm, dinner, homework, sleep again.

My sleep schedule is so off that come Tuesday my body won't know what to do.

Anyway, yesterday we had our actual chef for our fish class. We started out at 5am with usual pre-class duties like getting ice and removing fish for ID and Fabrication. We scale the fish (take the scales off) which I must say is the worst thing ever since scales are literally in every crevasse of your uniform and body. After that we do an ID for the day and go over the families of fish (Salmon/Trout, Cod, Bass, Flatfish, Misc). Then for the first time we pulled out our knifes and started to cut. We each did 3 flounders which yields 12 fillets. This is a flat fish and requires a flat cut method that isn't terribly hard once you get the hang of it. Although the chef said we did well, all of our fillets were pretty butchered for the most part. This kitchen provides fish to the entire school and every other kitchen in the school so if we mess up, they don't get fish... we don't mess up. We then clean-up and are in the lecture room from 9am-11am. Probably the strangest part of my day aside from waking at 4am is tasting. We taste everyday and since we start so early and are in lecture by 8:30-9am, that's when we taste. So yesterday we tasted 5 flatfish. First was flounder, it was flaky and pretty tasteless. Next was Dover Sole which is a pretty prized fish that is quite expensive and tastes like butter. Third we tried Turbot (pronounced Tur-bo) and it was interesting with a firm texture and almost milky taste. Next we tried Halibut which was firm but not terribly flavorful and lastly, we tasted Skate which is a ray. Easily the most interesting because it was extremely soft and kind of tasted like vegetables... I know, weird.

After a lazy night of homework and tv it was time for bed.

4:15 again. Awesome. In class at 5am and then scaling and getting ready for ID. We had a bunch of new fish today and after our ID we learned our new cuts and practiced. Salmon/Trout are almost all soft-boned and require a very easy straight-cut method. Basically all other round fish are hard-boned and require the much harder up-and-over method. We practiced both and my straight-cuts are pretty god because they are easy but both of my cuts came out pretty well. After clean-up we went to the lecture room for tasting... 11 kinds of fish at 8:30am, bleh. First taste, Atlantic Cod which is literally flavorless. Then Haddock which most people know as a fish and chips type fish. Next was Hake which was kind of crab-tasting but very fibrous. Then we tried Pollock (fun fact, Pollock is the fish used for almost all commercial fish, Filet O' Fish and generic fish consumption), its not very good otherwise. Cusk was next and it was gross, chewy and flavorless. The next batch is all Salmon and Trout so they all have strong flavor. First here was Atlantic Farm-Raised Salmon which is the salmon most people think about when they eat salmon, no one will ever see a wild Atlantic on their plate. It was ok, kind of sticky. Next was a better salmon, Coho (Silver) and this was less greasy and much cleaner in flavor. Then Arctic Char which is trout, it was my favorite and was briny with a mild salmon flavor. The next two Trouts, Steelhead and Farm-Raised Rainbow were both pretty good but the Farm-Raised was sticky and firm.

The rest of my day was my standard de-smellifying and sleeping before homework and hainging out. Only 2 more days till the weekend and I can't wait.

Chef Werblin