Food in Provence (and elsewhere)

I’m in the Demo kitchen this week and based on today’s experience, I hope I won’t be here again another week. Part of the problem—and I guess why I don’t have a partner—is that I’m cooking on the “wrong” side of a little side bar to the main counter, so the egonomics are really bad: I have to walk around the side bar and then between everyone else to get to the larder and the wash station. I don’t have any pans on my station either which wasn’t a problem today but is going to be tomorrow. Also, finding ingredients here isn’t as easy as in the other kitchens. And finally we are under pressure as the afternoon demos are set up during lunch time so they want us away early.

Anyway, the day started reasonably well, partly as I didn’t have that much to find before I set off to Kitchen 3 to start my white yeast bread. That’s not so hard: wake the yeast up with warm sugared water, mix some butter into flour and salt whilst that’s going on, mix everything together, wait 10-15 minutes and then knead. But they are keen on you kneading properly here so that takes 10 minutes or so. But my kneading passed muster and I must have done OK when I knocked the dough back later and shaped the loaves as (ahem) Darina wandered past when they were out of the oven and said she’d have been happy to have produced loaves like that.

Then we had to boil a loin of bacon. I was supposed to be doing this with another team but it was really just me in the end, not that there was much to do: put the joint in a large pan, cover it with cold water, bring it to the boil, cook for the requisite time and then take off the skin. Being in the demo kitchen had an impact on “the requisite time”, however. According to the weight, that was two hours. But (remember, we have to be out on time!), Julia, our teacher this week, wanted me to check after 75 minutes. Sure enough, it took close to the two hours so it got lots of prodding with a skewer to test for doneness!

I also had to bake an apple pie—one made with a very soft pastry. This was supposed to be left in the fridge for two hours to firm up but (as above…), we were told an hour would be enough. Probably just as well (even if the pastry was very soft when I was rolling it out) as it took well over an hour to bake rather than the 45-60 minutes of the recipe. Blowing my own trumpet again, Rory also wandered past my station and commented very favourably on the pastry and the cooking of the apples.

Along the way I also had to prepare ~1kg of rhubarb for a jam; this was left macerating with sugar overnight and will be cooked tomorrow. Apart from that, it’s breakfast dishes—I’m down to make Eggs Benedict and Avocado Toast. I think I should have time to add “Spotted Dog”—a soda bread with sultanas—but I’ll have to see what Julia thinks. My order of work shows it is possible but there’s the pressure to be finished early. A suivre…