Lobster and terrine

Lobster, an item you see on the menu, but never dared order it, cos' it costs way too much!  Well, we had a chance to make our very own lobster dish.  The grey/black lobster (before) flew in the very morning, almost late for our class, still alive of course..... the legs were moving and it was trying to get away from my platter of ingredients for that morning.  Sad fact is....we had to kill it.  No freezing, no dipping into boiling water.  Just a sharp knife, tip goes in, 'crack!' and split the head in half.  Squirmish girls may beckon the french chef instructor, ever willing to help..... Lobster a l'americaine, the red one (after), with raisin pilaf rice.  Why american?  Legend has it that a few americans showed up at a parisian restaurant late one night, for lack of ingredients by the time the restaurant was closing, a pair of lobster was idling in the fridge... the chef created a new recipe, the americans loved it, and it went on regular menu.

We also made guinea fowl with cabbage pie in class.  

Starters:  Eggplant caviar on toast with semi-oven dried tomatoes, verrine (terrine in a glass "verre") in 3 colors (tomato, goat cheese, avocado) with raw sea bream marinated in vanilla-infused olive oil.  Second, millefeuille wit tomatoes and confit fennel.  Third, white boudin, with caramelised apple.  We stuff our own sausages, of course.  (... and we hide it well too.)

The next dish on practical took over 2 sessions to prepare:  ballotine of chicken with foie gras mousse and pistachio.  It's like a sausage, or a terrine, if you like, wrap in a whole chicken, deboned.  Man, it's hell trying to debone a whole chicken in one piece!  Why they have so many bones anyway?  (By the way, we also have also made our own sausages in last week's recipe of duck legs pot-au-feu, fun stuff.)  It has to be slow cooked in prepared stock, and leave it in until it cools, thus, we only had the product today.  That is not all.  This is typically served on a buffet spread, and you need to have a presentation platter.  The first layer is a thick white coat of milk and gelatine, and next you make some decoration, and set it with a layer of thickened chicken consomme.   Each year there is a competition in France for such presentation platters.  Yes, you can each everything on the platter.  The squarish platter was the chef's demonstration, and the roundish one, mine.  I think I have to go for some fruit and veg carving class after this.  It's a very pretty picture.  You may not see it so well in the pics, it's like an archaic mirror.