Dernier Jour

Kaili and I woke up at 9 and then layed around til 10. SO thats somewhere between 2 and 3 hrs of sleep. Nice! I felt the start of a cold coming on...or it could have been last nites festivities with the smoke all around!!! We then got up, she got dressed then we went to my house so I could get dressed. We met up with Josephine, Cara, Andrew and his girlfriend Sophie for breakfast in Montmarte. It was a GREAT breakfast. After that, Kaili, Josephine and I went shopping for scarves. I actually bought one. It's pretty. That's a huge thing in Paris...so i have to fit in. After that at around 4 pm Kaili and I went back to her house and I snagged a few things that she didn't want to take home with her. We hung out for a while and at 7 pm we bid our goodbyes. I was very sad. I left her crying. And she was too. I can't type about it anymore or I'll get more sad. SO i came home and ate some dinner. I didn't do much, except some laundry, and at about 9 I went to bed!

September 28, 2007

Since i had a late night the night before I slept in a little late. I then got dressed and went to my training appt with Sebastien. WOOH! He worked my a$$ out! i was a sweaty girl when I was done. he made this plan for me that consists of a crazy up and down mess on the treadmill, then stairmaster, then bike and then 4 machines. I told him I don't like machines too much, so he figured out a plan for me where I would enjoy doing it. And i like this one ;) Anyway, I was at the gym for a little over 2 hrs, plus I saw my friend Ben so i chatted with him for a good while. I then came home and layed down and read some, ate some, did some laundry. Eventually (way later) I got dressed because I was going out for Kaili and Rick's last nite on the town. How sad! Anyway...it was a GREAT nite. We started out at Kaili's. Then we went to the Highlander (a bar). It was me, Kaili, Rick and his friend Anne, Jackson, Cara, Josephine, Dane, Rodolfo, and Alex. (plus Andrew and his girlfriend Sophie at Kaili's house) Let's just say I prepared myself for next weekend, Amsterdam ;) Oh...and it was national makeout day...and I succeeded at that too with a french guy named Matthieu! He took my number...but we'll see! We stayed there til around 4ish.

I stayed with kaili the entire nite. We then took a cab back to her place, but walked around for a bit to try and find food. What made us think Mcdonalds would be open at 5 am?!?! HA! So we got home at 5:35 and Kaili cooked. Ok...not really...but we made a frozen baguette, 3 mini pizza bagels, polenta left over from dinner, and Kaili made french fries. HAHAH! random, but fufilled our hunger. We went to bed around 7ish. Enjoy the pictures below :)

September 27, 2007

Went to the gym...came home and got dressed. Sent emails and went to school early. I finished my internship paperwork, and talked to peeps at school. At 3:30 we had our last class on mediterranean cooking. Dzintra was still sick. Fernando left after demo. It was me and Emi...plus we had two assistants today, Amy and another. Why we had 2, I will never know. We learned lamb in brik pastry with onions, almonds and parmesan with a side of hummus and a salad with cinnamon and vanilla flavored oil, then what we made was honey and spice roasted pigeon with figues and dates with a carrot and chicken jus and artichoke barigoule and dessert was yogurt ice cream with a blackberry coulis and strawberry and red wine jelly. Pretty good food....only took til the last day! Well, Emi and I worked our butts off and finished at 8 pm. I was so antsy because she doesnt speak english, so it was a true test to see how my french was! Luckily i had amy there to help :) (and teach me!)

After class I stayed and talked to amy for a little and then I walked home. Got home at 9ish. Kaili and Rick came over for a few minutes. Kaili had to pick some stuff up and gave me some stuff from her house! fun!!! Then they left and me being the lame person I am, decided to drink a bottle of white wine I had in the house that had been opened for 2 tbls for cooking. So i finished it. By myself. I went to bed at 1 am. Festive evening I shall say :)

September 26, 2007

I woke up again at 7:30 to go to the gym and Amy was dead asleep. When I came back I work her up and she made coffee :) We sat and chatted for a good while. We ate breakfast together, drank coffee, and had girl chats! It's nice to have sleepovers once in a while!!!! She left around 11 and I got dressed. I ate some lunch and then did NOTHING. I was the laziest person around today. I can't even remember what I did except respond to two VERY long emails I recieved. So i will say this. An email I recieved from a very close friend of mine, reminded me that one year ago I was performing in Joseph and I was about to say to my parents that I wanted to go to Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. I look back on it now and it was THE BEST decision I have ever made (except for maybe taking a year off of school...because that's what got me here now). It was the first time in my life that, for once, i finally did something for myself. And i know my parents my disagree because they will say i always get what i want and do what i want...but i dont think so. I always have friend guilt, parent guilt, jewish guilt, or just something on my shoulders...but this...i got up and did. All by myself. Just took off, went to paris, not knowing what was instore for me. And i succeeded BY FAR! And i am so glad i did this. YES i am thankful for everything. But if I wouldn't have made this decision to just go with it, I would have never been able to experience this wonderful life that I am living right now :) SO thank you and thanx for listening to me ramble :) Anyway, I went to school at 3:30. Dzintra was sick and Peter still wasn't there. We were worried a lot. Well long story short, the middle of class Sylvie came updstairs to tell us that Peter flew back home to do some interviews for jobs and he won't be returning. Well it was nice that he told US any of this!!!! Anyway...in class we learned veal shank and calfs foot in a jelly cook pot au feu style with baby veggies, cod with a mozarella, black olive and tomato crust with a cod potato puree, and dessert was lavandin infused creme brulee with caramelized fennel and oven roasted beefsteak tomatoes. I liked the creme brulee :) heehee. SO class was QUICK tonite. Me, Fernando and Emi knocked that sh&* out!! We were done by 8:30. I was told my plating was nice again.


Since Dzintra wasn't there I walked home. Now I'm typing. Going to read and going to bed :) toodles!

September 25, 2007

Well Amy was still asleep when I woke up at 7:30 to go to the gym. I did my work out and came home to find that she was gone! She left me a note though. So that was ok. Anyway, I got dressed and went to school. Yes early, but just for a minute to say hi to the woman who accepted me into the Gastronomy program and to accept my acceptance ;) (i just recieved my letter on friday-i didnt know they had so many applicants...so I just started telling people i was in!) Anyway, I came back home and started filling out my paper work for my internship. But it has to be in french, so I am trying to get some help on it. I tried to clean my room, but I got lazy! I got some leftovers together for school and my class and then I left to go to school. Today we learned a red mullet (NASTY) and fennel tart with candied oranges, chicken with crawfish steamed in seaweed with polenta covered in ham and some macaroni noodles and parmesan, and dessert was a strawberry and tomato gaspacho with berries and a thyme crisp. Dessert was outstanding. That's it. We once again worked collectively on the chicken dish. Peter wasn't there again. I don't know if I mentioned that yesterday or the day before. But he's been MIA since our class last thur. He didn't come to my party on sat either...so not we started getting worried. Anyway, we worked hard and fast. We overcooked our chicken...but we were just talking so much we didnt look at it too often! But I plated my dish and people seemed to like the plating.

After class Dzintra drove me and Amy home again. She decided one more night was prolly a good idea. I read and she talked to her boy and at 11 pm i crashed :)

September 24, 2007

I woke up this morning and I think I ate too much last nite. I didn't feel well and I couldn't sleep all nite, so I skipped the gym :( Oh well. Anyway, I played on my computer and looked up plane tickets to places. So all my destinations are almost booked!!! Anyway, I went to school at 3:30 and this week is Mediterranean! It would be better if we didn't have this chef...but you take the good with the bad! Anyway, we learned a goat cheese and spinach and tomato galette, a rabbit chartreuse with carrots, beans and onions, and for dessert a gratin with grapefruit and a sorbet that is VERY hard to describe...but I'll just say it takes like land...yes...like a landscape. hahaha. Anyway, he ended late, as usual for this chef. So we started late. He suggested we worked "atelier" style, meaning in a group together...so we did. It was SOOO boring though because we made the rabbit dish and there was NOTHING to do. So we were done by 9, but we still had one thing a piece to do. Chef said we didn't have to plate it, but each of us wanted to. It was so cool to see how we all plated them differently. I liked mine, but it definately wasn't my best work.

Anyway, Amy, who is our asst this week, needed a place to stay so I said she could stay by me. So Dzintra drove us home and we came home to eat and she chatted with her BF and I read a little then went to bed at 10:30.

Le Market

Sunday was lame. But then Kaili and I went to dinner at Jean-Georges Vongerichten's restaurant Le Market. I've been to two of his restaurants in NY (one of them on my 25th birthday). This place was outstanding. And Kaili and I had a blast!!! We splurged majorly...but it was worth it...especially since it was our last dinner together. We had the best bottle of red wine I have ever tasted! Plus our meal was exceptional. So simple yet so delicious. See for youself :) We ordered stuff and just split it all!

Black Plate (appetizers)

Sauces

Duck

Mushrooms, figues and beans

Lamb

Cheesecake

Chocolate Cake
It was a great evening. I'm not sure about Kaili, but i think for me, it was a long overdue dinner waiting to happen. It was nice. Good company and good food. 3 hrs later I came home and went to bed at 12. What a GREAT way to end the weekend!!!