Rattle Those Pots

Bonjour amis!

I am mangling French. Sure wish we were brought up speaking more than one language in the U.S.

Well, we’re settled into our apartment, Charlie won’t move from in front of the fireplace and is unfortunately starting to closely resemble a stuffed albino pig, and we’re routinely making a mess out of our kitchen (in a good way). Very cozy, and eager to start school.

We’ve skated a few times on the Rideau Canal, we’ve met and like our neighbors, and in a shocking development have located several fun pubs in the blocks surrounding our place. Our apartment is in a four-unit restored brick Victorian in downtown Ottawa, with Chinatown and Little Italy walking distance to the west, and shops/restaurants, etc., on Bank and Elgin (two major streets) a couple of blocks to the east. We can ride the bus or ride bikes when it’s warmer to school, but we walked it today and it’s only about 30 minutes. We’ve also discovered that there’s a fun casino (Casino du Lac-Leamy), with hotel and spa that is a 10-minute cab ride away in Hull (Quebec). We’ll more than likely have to go explore before long…

Fun Ottawa Trivia

Here are a few fun little factoids we’ve learned:

• Wellington Street, a few blocks from our apartment, has the world’s single largest gold depository beneath it, stored in the Bank of Canada gold vaults. (Can anyone mail a jackhammer?)
• Famous Ottawans: Dan Aykroyd, Alanis Morissette, Rich Little, Tom Green, Paul Anka, Margaret Atwood, Peter Jennings, and Mathew Perry.
• Two of the food items Ottawa is known for are “Poutine,” basically tasty fries with cheese curds and gravy (strange, but good), and “Beavertails,” a flat pastry with either cinnamon and sugar, maple and chocolate, or garlic and cheese. There are Beavertail stands near fires all along the Rideau Canal, and we tried our first when we went skating on the canal the other day. Not the healthiest thing, but definitely tasty.
• Here’s my favorite; it’s a great story (Dad, you’ll love this one): one block behind us, on Somerset Street, is the apartment building where Igor Gouzenko, a KGB Intelligence Office working undercover in 1945 as a cipher clerk in the Russian Legation in Ottawa, lived. Gouzenko provided evidence that led to the arrest of 15 Soviet spies and 22 local agents in Canada, with ties to several in the United States and Great Britain, as well. We learned that the event is viewed as being one of the pivotal events that began the Cold War. It’s a great story: on September 5, 1945, Gouzenko removed 109 documents from the Soviet Embassy that confirmed the Soviets had set up a spy network involving dozens of public servants. Problem was, no one believed him for two entire days, so this poor guy was running around town with the stolen documents, terrified and hiding from the Soviets who were hunting all over for him. He’d gone to the Ottawa Journal first, where staff turned him away twice, ignoring his documents and saying he was crazy. Next he tried the police, who also didn’t believe him, until two Canadian officials sitting on a bench outside, watching his apartment, saw a group of Soviets head into his building late on the second night. (Gouzenko had asked his neighbors across the hall earlier that night if his pregnant wife and child could stay with them to hide; they would see, through their neighbors’ peephole, the four Soviets break into their apartment that night.) Canadian officials finally put Gouzenko into protective custody, where he remained until he died in 1985. From a May 2003 Globe and Mail article: “His documents and testimony resulted in a royal commission on espionage, and convictions and prison terms for 11 Canadian officials. The Gouzenko case probably prevented the sleepers in place in 1945 from recruiting second- and third-generation agents in Canada, Britain and the United States who could have done damage for decades. The secret documents not only provided direct evidence of Soviet treachery, they gave Western code breakers texts that helped them decipher many other intercepted Soviet messages.”
• Queen Victoria named Ottawa the Canadian capital on December 31, 1857. One story says she made the decision by sticking her hatpin on a map roughly halfway between Toronto and Montreal (and hitting Ottawa), and another version is that she liked some watercolors she had seen in Ottawa. The probable reason apparently was that she didn’t want to antagonize either English or French speakers, and the other city candidates were viewed as being too firmly rooted in either the French or English tradition.

C’est bon! C’est bon!

We don’t start at Cordon Bleu until next month, but we sat in on a class today and were impressed (and relieved). We went in praying that we wouldn’t discover that the entire demonstration class (3 hours) was devoted to something as simple as polenta, and thankfully, left the school as happy campers.

Basically, each day we’ll have a three-hour demonstration class, during which the chef will go through each recipe, step by step, with mirrors overhead and video screens all over the place (so the students can see everything). Following that, we’ll have the practical class when we each cook all of the recipes (and are graded on each one).

We got a kick out of what the recipes were for today’s class alone:

Lesson 23:
Blanquette de Cuisses de Grenouilles (Frogs’ Legs Blanquette)
Coquilles Saint-Jacques Provençales (Scallops with Tomatoes)
Pâte Feuilletée (Puff Pastry)
Feuilletés D’escargots aux Campignons des Bois (Puff Pastry filled with Snails and Wild Mushrooms)
Moules Marinières (Steamed Mussels)
Praires Farcies (Stuffed Clams)

We got to munch everything afterward and chatted with the chef for quite a while, so we were pretty happy peeps. We’ve bought our enormous supply kits that we’ll need for classes, and are complete geeks pawing over them. Fun!

Interesting quick trivia on the house and school

• Cordon Bleu (Paris) received its first international student (a Russian) in 1897, and its first Japanese student in 1905.
• After 1945, it was the only school in France accredited by the U.S. for professional retraining of American soldiers under the GI bill. (When Julia Child attended, she was the sole woman in a class of half a dozen GI students.)
• Cordon Bleu now has diploma programs in Paris, London, Sydney, Ottawa, Adelaide, Korea and Tokyo, and smaller programs in six other countries.
• The house where the Ottawa branch of Cordon Bleu is located (above) was built in 1874 and renovated in the 1930s. It was occupied by different families until 1940, when the Department of National Defence leased and used the house as a residence for the Woman’s Royal Canadian Navy Service during the Second World War. In 1999, André J. Cointreau (descendant of French Cointreau family and current Cordon Bleu president) purchased the house for the Ottawa campus of Le Cordon Bleu.

After shamelessly pawing our way in the door, we started our stage at Beckta two weeks ago, and I’m happy to report are having a ball. We go in on separate days, and learn quite a bit each time (shortcuts, technique, etc.). When I go in I’m sometimes the only gal there (only one other woman works there), so the conversation gets pretty…salty. Their chefs and cooks are so talented and organized, though, and we’re lucky to even be there, so given that, I really don’t care how colorful conversation gets. I didn’t know it until Thom found this out the other day, but the year they opened, Beckta was named the third best new restaurant in the country. Not too shabby.

We’ve both already gotten little nicks, and when swapping stories with each other we found out that we’d each been burned the same way by oil from the deep fryer (when we turned our backs for a second, we hadn’t realized someone had dropped the basket when we turned back around and tossed canapés in—*splash!* Oops, won’t make that mistake again).

I’m a complete geek in my excitement over some of the kitchen appliances; you should see some of these mixers! And now I know how the big gadget that cuts steak fries up works; I’d always wondered about that. I just have a blast firing the crème brûlée and making things like chocolate blini and their blood orange pudding (really a cross between a soufflé and small cake). We both agree, though, that after separating 60 yolks from egg whites, your fingers start to get numb. I’m also praying I don’t ever get stuck in the big meat freezer (set at 0 degrees). Yowza.

One of my favorite parts about helping out at Beckta has been the food; they want us to try each dish so we’re familiar with each one, so all night people will bring over everything from their seared scallops and herb potato gnocchi to their goat cheese truffles and beef tartare. I was in seventh heaven when one of the line cooks brought over a serving-size piece of foie gras; I asked “Is this for me?” and he said, “Sat waiting for pick-up too long; started to fall.” I didn’t notice that it looked particularly flat, but of course didn’t debate. (One of the fellows from the garde manger station came over and ate half of it, though, so I’ll have to guard my “stash” better, or eat more quickly.)

We were quickly informed that the chefs keep a scale by the door (they really do), and make you weigh yourself before you leave the kitchen each night, saying that if you haven’t lost a pound, you haven’t been worked hard enough.

* * * * *

In closing, this is by far the most bizarre study I’ve come across, but it’s fun to see where you fit. You have to wonder what kind of people get paid for things like this…

You Are What You Snack

According to Dr. Alan R. Hirsch’s (a neurologist and director of the Smell & Taste Treatment and Research Foundation in Chicago) recent study, “Snack Food Hedonics and Personality,” junk food preferences say something about who you are. The study — which should be taken with a grain of salt and a healthy dose of skepticism — was underwritten by the Snack Food Assn. and the National Potato Promotion Board.

Dr. Hirsch’s research suggests:
* Potato-chip lovers are “ambitious, successful high achievers who enjoy . . .the trimmings of
their success.”
* Tortilla-chip eaters are “humanitarians who are often distressed by inequities and injustices
of society.”
* Pretzel people are trend-conscious. They “seek novelty” and are “lively, enthusiastic and fun
to be with!”
* Cheese-curls adherents are “formal, conscientious and always proper.”
* Meat-snack types tend to be “gregarious,” “generous to a fault” and male. They sacrifice
their own comfort to please others.
* Cracker snackers are “contemplative and thoughtful”; they base decisions on “logic rather
than emotions.” Dr. Hirsch predicts that “those who prefer crackers may easily find
themselves romantically involved in an Internet relationship.”

To find your snack food Mr. or Mrs. Right, you should know that potato-chip lovers are most compatible with pretzel people. Tortilla chippers should stick to their own. Pretzel people play with well others. Proponents of snack crackers go for those promiscuous pretzel people. Cheese curlers make a cute couple with potato and tortilla chippers. And meat snackers are meat-and-potato chip people.

(Inspired by “Snack Food for Thought,” a March 29, 1999 Ellen Alperstein article that appeared in the Los Angeles Times.)

Au revoir tout le monde,

Jen