Day 3 of final exams for course I.

I'm feeling more confident with my time management as the week goes on. With a well-thought out plan, I feel that I'm able to produce the dishes in a fairly efficient manner, without rushing them.

Not rushing is a key to a good mushroom risotto, which is one of the dishes we are tasked with. Once again, we are told to skip making the mushroom stock ("to streamline" things) and simply use chicken stock. That isn't for me. You get much more mushroom flavor from use of a mushroom stock, as well as a lovely deep color.

We weren't issued enough mushrooms to make stock (or any celery for the mirepoix), but I scavange enough mushroom stems and a couple of portabello stems to proceed (missing only the celery).

Although the mushroom stock takes a good deal of time, I got the rice pilaf in the oven first, since it takes very little time to prep. I put the mise cup of rice under the faucet to "rinse til clear" and then mince the shallots and brunoise the carrot. I needed minced shallot for other dishes, so I minced enough for everything all at once. The brunoised carrot was the most precise knife cut needed, so better to get it out of the way first, leaving the rest of the carrot to be used in less demanding cuts. This worked out well, since the carrot was one of those that had a great texture and orange color on the outside, but a much paler, nearly transparent root core. All my brunoise had to come from the outer layers of the carrot.

The rest of the rice pilaf procedure is simplicity itself: sweat the shallots and carrot; coat the rice with the oil and cook til opaque, add liquid of choice (chicken stock in this case) and herbs (thyme and bay leaf); bring to a simmer; stir; cover; and, put into oven for 10-15 minutes. Once out of the oven, you let the rice stand for 10 minutes, then fluff with a fork, add butter and season.

Unfortunately, mine came out overcooked. Probably cooked it too much on the stovetop. Ah well. Not much to be done there. Last time it was perfect.

I got the mushroom stock going with the pilaf in the oven. To develop the most flavor and color you need to sweat the heck out of the mushrooms, at least ten minutes. I don't know how long I let the mushrooms sweat, but I simply kept an eye on it and an occasional stir while I prepped the marinated grilled vegetables. Once the mushrooms were properly sweated, just add water, sachet and simmer for about 45 minutes.

Vegetable prep for the grill is pretty quick. The cuts are thick and simple, since the vegetables (eggplant, zucchini, squash, portabello, asparagus) need to be able to survive on a very high heat grill (this ain't no backyard bbq). Once cut, you set the vegetables aside with a sprinkling of salt on both sides to draw out some of the liquid. While the vegetables were losing moisture, I prepped the marinade, which was a semi-stable balsamic vinaigrette with dijon mustard as the emulsifying agent.

The marinade didn't take long to make, so I still had time before the vegetables would be ready for their bath. I switched gears, and prepped the filling for the ravioli. I wanted it to spend some time in the lowboy setting up before actually making the stuffed pasta. With that done, I then worked on the braised artichokes in white wine, getting my vegetables marinating at the same time.

I was midway through braising the artichokes when a grill opened and I could put those beautiful grill marks on the veggies. Some simple but elegant plating and I was finished with two dishes. The braised artichokes followed shortly thereafter. I had some extra bacon (which is used in the artichoke dish), so I quickly fried that up and garnished the plate with bacon bits (and who doesn't like bacon bits?). Three plates down.

I was doing pretty good, time-wise. I knew this because I had to set up the pasta machine station. No one else had rolled out their pasta dough, so I was the first. I feel very good about my pasta rolling technique, actually. Plus, I like doing it. There is simply something satisfying about making fresh pasta.

Anyway, I took my rolled pasta and made my ravioli. I went with a simple circle shape to contrast with the other pasta I would serve. I was thinking about the dish the night before and always came back to the pasta left over from cutting the ravioli, the extra bits of pasta that just get thrown away. So, this time, I cut out some diamond-shaped maltagliati pasta from the scaps to contrast with the round ravioli. It plated well, I thought, and gave the dish an extra plus.

Finally, with the mushroom stock finished, I ended the day with my risotto.

An okay day. The only real problem dish was the pilaf, but I know I've nailed it before. My ravioli still have a tendency to get a little air in the pocket. That is something I worked on hard this time, but didn't get perfect.