Culinary School Day One, Part One: CAP 103

CAP 103 is Latin for Introduction to Professional Cooking Skills and Techniques. It's the class you take after Culinary Sanitation which I bypassed because I'm awesome and just went to take my ServSafe exam to get certified. I'm really hoping that's not going to come back and bite me in the donkey.

This is the class that is really important prior to starting the rest of the culinary program. There's definitely a waitlist for it, but I lucked out and only waited for three  or so weeks to register for it because someone couldn't pay. Once I pass this class, I get into the Culinary Arts school and from there, the waitlist takes about a semester. I really need that because I need time to work on my savings and working, but never fear! There are culinary courses that don't require the rotating schedule and that will be on my list for next semester: Culinary Nutrition and  Introduction to the Chemistry of Food for Culinary Arts. Sounds fun AMIRIGHT??? Don't worry, I'll make it fun! God, help me…

Imagine the worries I had coming into the class. The day before, I was in tears because I had no idea how I was going to pay for the $249 chef hat. We all know how that worked out in the last post. The morning of, I had my nails trimmed, my pants pressed, and my chef coat buttoned. I was afraid that I would be the oldest person in the room. I was afraid that they would kick me out because my long braids didn't quite fit in the chef hat. I was afraid I would be the OBK (Only Black Kid) like the old days and no one would talk to me. I was afraid that everyone memorized the book cover to cover and the chef would constantly choose me to answer his many, many questions from 8:00am to 5:24pm. None of that happened. We didn't even stay the full day. Here's how it really went down.

My support is my boyfriend. When I'm afraid, he can make me feel better because he's silly and confident. He drove me to class and walked me up to the door like a kindergartener. He chatted with one of the chef's while I took a seat in the back of the class. There were three girls in front of me that I immediately joked with because they were also trying to fit their hair into the hat. Some people didn't even have a hat on. After getting advice to put my hair in a bun and stuff, I sat, staring around the kind of diverse room (I mean there were only black and white people, no Asians, no Hispanic people like I'm used to at MSU). There were quite a few older people, women, black people, and our professor, Chef Shawn Loving, was a nice looking black man.

Chef Loving was everything his name implied. He was so warm, witty, and real. He is the first teacher I've heard in my whole life say 'I'm not going to sit here and read you the syllabus. For what? You can read it at home!' He got right to the point. Of course we had to do introductions which always make me nervous, but I faked the confidence. He even teased me for being a Spartan. Sorry I made the only correct university choice in life! (Cut me and I bleed green).

The college itself is freaking amazing. Everyone who has ever told me it is one of the best culinary facilities in the country was quite obviously being truthful. The class room was a demo kitchen. We sat in chairs behind tables and in the front was a kitchen. There were three TV screens that detailed what the chef was doing as he showed it. 

It's lesson time lovelies! Our first lesson detailed the Kitchen Brigade. What is that, you ask? Why let me tell you! Without the help of my book. Created by Auguste Escoffier (yep you can say it all fancy ess-COFF-ee-AY), the Kitchen Brigade system basically gives each person the job they need to do while in the kitchen. It eliminates the chaos. Imagine you run a kitchen and there are about ten chefs. You're running around pulling up the fryer, the oven goes off you run over to open it while someone else places something in the fryer, the veggies need to be sautéed but two people are fighting over who should chop the garnish. If there is a designated fry chef, sauté chef, and veggie chop person, then wouldn't they make things so much better?  Here's a great guide to familiarize yourself with the various roles. I need to know all of these terms, including the French terms.

After the lesson, we toured the kitchens to learn all of the equipment we need to know for our practical exam which is the big timed final test the last two days of class. A few facts about Schoolcraft culinary institute:

• There is literally a separate kitchen for everything. You will not make sausages in the pastry kitchen or borrow items from the bread kitchen. Each kitchen has their own special equipment and dishes. There is a donut fryer in the pastry kitchen, a deck oven in the bread kitchen, and a smoking machine in the butchery kitchen.
  

• There is a machine called a 'panning machine' that coats things like candies and nuts with chocolate or a candy shell. According to Chef Loving, there are only three in the US, one in a New York restaurant, one in the M&M factory, and a nice copper-colored one at Schoolcraft. How awesome is that?
• Of the 74 Master Chefs in the US, 5 are at Schoolcraft College. Of the 13 Master Pastry Chefs, 1 is at Schoolcraft College.
• Our experience at the college will consist of us working at the student-run gourmet restaurant, The American Harvest. It's where we will live the Kitchen Brigade system the most, and give us our experience to gain a CC credential right after graduation.
  
• In Chef Loving's words, 'You can look for frozen and canned prepared foods around here all you want, but you won't find it, it doesn't exist.' If it can be made fresh, it is made fresh at the college. Even our own hot dogs.
• The style of cooking taught is French Classical Cooking.

I hope you've become just as excited and interested as I have! Part two is coming soon… don't want to bog you down with too much information! I will share with you one last funny bit of information. Of course, there's always that person who doesn't pay attention. THIS person in particular decided not to and just ask questions when Chef Loving clearly told us about it. Seriously? What a waste of time!