More Fish and Cake Decorating

Catfish Etouffee

Ahh fish. So we meet again. You and your slimy, gross ways. I went into Monday's class wanting to like you. Heck, I was practically begging my taste buds to derive some sort of pleasure from a giant plate of various fishes but I'm sorry to say, no dice. I still just don't like you.

After my last run in at school with fish, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little nervous about a whole day based around those creatures of the sea but I kept hoping that maybe the more exposure I get, the easier it will become.  Still being a little scarred, my first reaction to fish day was to avoid it all together and (for the first time ever) volunteer to make the day's dessert.  But then I got disappointed with myself for trying to take the easy road. Dammit, I wanted to learn to make fish! So I volunteered to help make the Catfish Etouffee.  Maybe if I made it and got a better understanding of it, I'd develop more of an appreciation and like it more?

Catfish Etouffee

I did not (ugh). I still found myself totally grossed out by it and thought I was going to pass out when I realized that my partner and I had to make a giant pot of Fumet (fish stock...i.e. fish parts cleaned out and simmering in a pot and then drained). Ugh. I get chills just thinking about it.  But I somehow survived and found myself sitting at our end of the day family dinner with a plate of salmon, bass, sardines, halibut and the catfish. I took a bite of every single one and nada, zip, nothing. That's not to say that my fellow chefs-in-training did a bad job, they put together truly beautiful dishes and everyone else in the class was really enjoying them, except me.

After all was said and done I got to thinking about this whole fish subject. Maybe it's okay that I don't like it. In fact, I know many chefs that have strong dislikes for a certain food item. One of my chef instructors absolutely hates raw vegetables. Another chef friend of mine gets so grossed out by the texture of cornstarch he can barely be in the same room as it. Heck, even Indiana Jones had a severe phobia of snakes. (Granted he wasn't trying to cook them but I think I can still draw the parallel.) I tried and tried and gave it my best shot but I just don't like fish. Cutting my losses and moving on..

On the flip side of that, on Tuesday we had cake decorating day. As much as cake isn't my favorite thing to eat, I absolutely love decorating it. With a pastry bag in one hand and a blank canvas of a cake in front of me, I find it so therapeutic and totally meditative to focus so intently on transforming a plain old cake into a work of art.

On tap for next week, shellfish (yeck!) and more cake decorating (hooray!) Only six more weeks of school. How is this moving so quickly?