Culinary School: Kitchen Talk

Well...it sure has been awhile. Almost two months. School for Vivian and me has been fairly hectic. Vivian is currently across the country and taking 17 units worth of classes every 10 weeks - so please bear with her as she gets used to the schedule. I, as some of you may know, am attending Le Cordon Bleu College of the Culinary Arts. I am taking their Baking and Patisserie program; the program is 21 months long. It is divided into "terms" and each term is 6 weeks long. Meaning, each class is six weeks long. So, things are sped up and it is quite the busy schedule. I am currently on my third term - Intro to Baking and Patisserie. I completed my first term (Culinary Foundations 1, Food Safety and Sanitation and Career Success) and my second term (Culinary Foundations 2). The hardest of these was Culinary Foundations 2, it was so rushed and so stressful, I had multiple breakdowns while cooking. The thing with this industry is, you have to push through it. You can't just give up because it's hard - you keep going.

Since I am starting to get a better hang of my schedule (another reason I started blogging again was because I changed from the 6AM class to the 10AM class) I have decided to start a new series called "Culinary School" and basically it is going to what I've learned whilst at Le Cordon Bleu and what I have learned/noticed in the kitchen. 

Today's topic: Kitchen Talk. For those of you that don't know "kitchen talk" is the lingo used in the kitchen.

"Knife" - Someone in the kitchen is walking with a knife.

"Knife behind" - Someone is behind you holding a knife.

"Knife in sink" - There is a knife in the sink.

"Oven open" - Someone is opening the oven to either check on a product or take a product out.

"Hot pan/pot/tray/etc" - Someone is walking around carrying a hot object.

"Hot behind" - Someone is behind you carrying something hot.

Now, you may think that this is pretty straight forward and wonder why I'm even writing a blog post on this. To me, the importance of kitchen talk is not what you're saying, it's why you're saying it and having open communication with everyone in the kitchen. If someone is right behind you and you're carrying a bowl of flour or eggs and they don't communicate with you that they are behind you, you could easily bump into them and spill product. Or, if someone is walking around with a knife, hot pan, hot tray, etc. and they don't say exactly what they're doing - it could cause an injury. 

Kitchen talk is about communication and safety. When you use kitchen talk, you are not only protecting yourself from possible injury, but also the other people in the kitchen. They don't know what you are doing at your station - they're focusing on what they're doing. So by communicating and alerting to the kitchen that there is a knife in the sink, or that you are walking with a hot object, they are aware and they can be on the lookout and move out of the way if/when needed. 

I hope this was educating for you all, I know that it may seem boring or it doesn't apply to you, but trust me, communication is key in any situation. We all need to remember to keep an open communication with the people in our life.

xo,

Bekah!