Work, work, work!

I’m enjoying the tasty bread, reintroduction to shellfish (it’s local and fair, I promise), and beautiful weather we’ve been graced with, but I really miss my internet connection.   The school has a few computers and wireless (or so I’m told), but I haven’t been able to get my computer to connect and I am working the majority of the time that the school is open.  So, you’ll have to excuse late postings like these, as well as poor communication in general. 

I will respond to all letters… please write me!

Molly Clauhs

Ballymaloe Cookery School

Shanagarry

County Cork

Ireland

So… let’s see. It is now Tuesday evening around 10:00pm. I should be going to bed soon but I am feeling very energetic.  Until yesterday I had a roommate but she moved into Natalie’s room (Natalie won’t be back for a few weeks) so I am on my own. I pushed the two twin beds together and it is huge. So I am currently swimming in this monstrous bed while I type away. Ali just walked in and said my bed is like a wrestling ring—WWF!  The students cooked a lot of food today so I’ve eaten really well. Maybe too well?

But before getting into food, I have two days of work to recount.  Yesterday was my first day so I put on my chef’s clothes, green headband, and favorite earrings (thanks Mom!) and trekked through the wildflower garden with my housemates to get to school.  This week there are two short courses going on taught by Rachel Allen. The Allen family is really complex and interesting, more on them later. I would say Rachel is the most glamorous member of the family and she currently has a cooking show series on Irish TV. She is Darina’s daughter in law and is nice as could be. The courses are two and a half days each. So yesterday the students had demonstrations in both the morning and afternoon, cooked this morning, had a demonstration in the afternoon, and will cook tomorrow morning, concluding the course at lunchtime. Another group will being their session with an afternoon demo and continue on, finishing Friday.

Since the first day of Rachel’s course was all demos, we cooked lunch for the students. I helped with that but mostly cleaned beans and washed dishes.  I am really not picky about what job I get since my main concern is not getting in the way. I sat down for lunch after the students had eaten with a couple other workers, and then Darina arrived.  She wanted to sit down withMichala and I, so the three of us talked for a few minutes basically introducing ourselves and talking about what we hope to learn. Darina has down amazing things, but she is the kind of person who asks a question but doesn’t listen to the answer and is always looking past you thinking of the next thing she needs to do.  Both Michala and I are interested in working in the gardens, so her husband Tim came over and talked to us about the farm. He then took us on a tour of the property and talked to us about the history. He is such a nice guy and this was my favorite part of my time in Ireland so far. We picked apples for an hour, came to understand how the farm’s composting system works (absolutely nothing is wasted), met the pigs and chickens, and spent some time in the glass houses (aka green houses).  We picked and ate tomatoes, smelled different types of basil, ate whole cucumbers, and had a really fun time learning about it all.  I got really dirty and really excited about helping out of the farm.

I started my morning weighing out ingredients so that the students would have everything ready at their stations. This is a huge job and pretty much all the ladies that work at the school start the morning doing this. I then cleaned lettuce for about two hours. It was picked that morning and it made such a beautiful salad. The salad spinner is huge and by the time I was done, I was pretty much over it. Then I cleaned beans and helped students find things (even though I don’t yet know where things are, I just pretended). I helped with the flow of lunch and then fixed myself a plate and sat outside on some stone steps facing the gardens and ate. They are a bit more lenient with work experience (that’s how I am classified) so I can get away with that. It was a glorious ten minutes because I ate a huge helping of salad – very well cleaned, I must say, green beans, rice, and shellfish stew. The stew had fresh crab legs, shrimp, and scallops caught a few miles from the school. It was delicious. After lunch I helped with cleaning and set tables. Then I sat down with all the ladies and had some dessert… chocolate pudding – amazing. I spent the better part of the afternoon helping the lady who prepares all the food for Saturday’s farmer’s market. I chopped onions and ladled soup into containers. We didn’t finish work until about 6:00pm and I guess that is typical.

It is a lot of work but so far things are going well. Today Ali called it a glorified cleaning job and I think that is partially true. But I am absorbing a lot being around the action and I ask a lot of questions. When the 12-week course students arrive they will be in charge of cleaning the lettuce, doing the dishes, setting tables, etc. I am happy to know I will be relieved of that work in two weeks or so. But in the mean time I am trying to be positive about it, because it is impossible to work for 10 hours without a positive outlook. But the people are so nice (met a woman from Syracuse today!), and the food is so delicious… and most of all, the whole operation stands for something. It is more than just a cooking school. It is an organization encouraging the use of fresh, local food to enrich our lives and our bodies, and that message is carried about in everything the school does. The ethics to what we are doing makes it all worthwhile. Not to mention, it is a really well run business and I think it will be the basis for some interesting projects once I get back to school.

Well, it has been a nice leisurely evening. I finished Garlic & Sapphires and I strongly recommend it. Such an interesting book!  I am going to get ready for bed because I have a full day of lettuce cleaning, onion chopping, and bean cleaning tomorrow! ;-)