Baking in the Big Apple!

Instead of jetting over to some other European country for vacation during our Fall Break like most of the other students, we ironically decided to fly back to the States to work! Our school offered a week-long course to go to NYC and work four different events held at De Gustibus, the Astor Center, and the James Beard House. By the week’s end, we gained a lot of experience, had tons fun, and made some unforgettable memories! Here’s a quick view into our very busy week, along with a few of our adventures too…

A special thank you to Phil Gross for capturing the James Beard Foundation events in photos and allowing us to share some of them in our blog:

Our week started off prepping at the French Culinary Institute. We had boxes and boxes of Italian ingredients that we smuggled to NYC to make sure the dishes were as authentic as possible!  Our kitchen brigade started off at De Gustibus (located on the 8^th Floor of Macy’s Herald Square), where the head chefs did live demos of each course while the audience members watched, learned, and dined. The next day, we were off to the Astor Center, where we would serve over 20 different preparations, buffet-style with wine pairings at each table. Finally, our week ended at the James Beard House, with Italian Riviera inspired lunch and dinner menus.  It was such an honor for us to work in this kitchen of the Beard Foundation—a prestigious non-profit dedicated to preserving the “foodie culture” that has taken flight in the States. After many, many… and many more hours of prepping and a whole lot more experience under our belts, we received our certification from the James Beard House!  (AKA great resume builder for the future! :])

A group of students in our program were also recording the whole event along with interviews before and after the entire week. Below you can see a little peek at our Pastry Brigade as well as some of the prep work that was involved!

Besides our jam-packed week of work, we found a few hours to play in the city. Although Florence has become such an amazing home for the two of us, there are just those certain things that we miss from America….large coffees from Starbucks, cheeseburgers, sweet potato fries, pulled pork sandwiches, guacamole, cupcakes, micro beers, margaritas, “open 24 hrs”…I think you’re getting our drift. We didn’t even realize how much we were deprived of these amazing things until they were right at our fingertips! Come on, endless amounts of pizza, pasta, and wine are great, but sometimes nothing can compare to some of those American classics! At the end of prepping every night, our taste buds would start salivating and our minds would start racing with all of the possibilities of delicious food we could dive into for dinner.

Now, we know what you’re thinking…didn’t these girls do anything that didn’t revolve around food?!? Well, it just so happens we did! We were able to go on a mini shopping spree at Forever 21, go to the Disney Store to go on a roller coaster (well ok, it was only the escalator), and play in the snow! We even worked out too!…alright, caught again…we only hauled luggage around the city each day, but come on, give us a bit of credit. After all, they were 50lbs each!

All the conveniences and comforts that we came into contact over those 10 days were little reminders of all the cultural differences between the States and Italy.  Being surrounded by all these familiarities made us both a bit homesick and miss all of you back home.  But all in all, even with all the hard work, minimal sleep, and the unexpected homesickness, we had an amazing time, and wouldn’t trade the experience for anything!

Let Wegs and Shet Woes

You’re probably thinking, “They’ve lost their minds in Italy”. Before you jump to any conclusions, let us explain our day…

It started out getting registered with our school. Everything went smoothly, and we were even told about an amazing meet and greet dinner taking place in the evening. It was 5 euro for a drink and all you can eat appetizers.

Did we know the time of the dinner? No.

Did we know the address? Not really.

Could we find the information on any flyers? Nope.

Did we go anyways? Absolutely!

Well, I guess you could say we found it. After a long trek across the city, our nerves started to rise as we got closer and wondered if we’d be aged 10 years by all of the “college-aged” students we’d be joining. 10 years may be an exaggeration, but just go with it!

So we walked up to “GANZO” (which we later find out translates to “fools”… go figure), and the door is locked. Clearly, there are people inside that we can see through the full glass door.  Finally, an Italian man who badly needed a shower, let us in with no explanation on how the evening was to run. We walked around a little confused because everyone there was at least in their 40’s (so ironically, our fear of being aged backfired in the opposite direction).

After looking so confused for about 10 minutes, another guy explained that it was a private club and we needed to buy a membership card AND pay the original cover fee. Needless to say, we decided it wasn’t our kind of scene.

Conveniently across the street, there was a lovely Enoteca – 6 euros for a beer and all you can eat appetizers – now we’re talking! We were the only Americans, but we sat in front of the chef who kindly gave us our very own free plate of delicious hot pasta. We felt special. Our embarrassing encounter turned out to be a great evening…until the walk home.

Well, the walk home wasn’t too bad except for the fact that the street by our apartment always gets “cleaned” AKA the cobble stones get drenched with water ever night (probably recycled water at that). So on our walk home, our sandals always splash water all over our shoes and legs. Maybe it was the one beer talking or just the eventful evening, but when we attempted to say we had “Wet Legs and Wet Shoes” it came out “Let Wegs and Shet Woes”, hence the name of this blog post.

Before the Journey Begins…

In the months prior to our big departure, I (Kelsey) moved into Courtney’s house and became part of the Hamlin family. It feels like the adventure has already began as it seems every night someone is baking up something delicious in the kitchen. Desserts galore keep our sweet tooth extremely satisfied! Courtney recently graduated from […]