Week 11 – I am now a Leiths Graduate !

Dissected and Tasted Exam cook

This final week at Leiths was devoted entirely to students Practical Exams with them being spread over 4 days and the Friday earmarked for potential resits. We had been practising our Ballotines and Tarte Tatin since gaining the knowledge of our task during the exam, and our Fridges were crammed with Chickens awaiting their deboning fate ! My own practice time was more limited as my exam was on the first day –  What would become Manic Monday !

I did one complete run through of all of the dishes we would need to prepare,  trying my utmost to follow the Timeplan I had devised, and to finish within the allotted five and a half hours. It was an extremely punishing and busy cook, and incredibly I finished on the dot of five and a half hours – albeit the last 30 minutes was spent awaiting my Tarte to bake whilst washing up. In practice my Tarte was a little – shall we say – over Caramelised, but the rest of the dishes came out well. I slightly tweaked my Timeplan to give an option to make the required Creme Anglais earlier during the cook and decided to do no more. As I only had the weekend before my exam there was no more time to practice, and therefore I determined to cook nothing on the Sunday and chill – hopefully being ready for the exam itself on Monday.( Some other students who had their exams later in the week would be practising every day – God only knows how many Ballotines were in their freezers !)

The Exam itself – Whilst having a mini meltdown during the exam over different dried mushrooms (not understanding which were required for Consommé and which for the Ballotine stuffing), the rest of the cook went quite well. The exam commenced at 8.30 but we had to be in school at 08.00 am for registration, and in the kitchen at 08.15 for Mis En Place. There was certainly no opportunity to rest during the cook and you needed to work with speed and efficiency over the allotted time. However for me I felt it went better than my Intermediate Exam where their was a bread to make – something that is susceptible for variations on the timing needed for Rising and Proving etc. This exam was more prescriptive, and whilst there were a lot of tasks to complete – especially early on – following a good time plan, remembering to season appropriately, and being able to multi task enabled me to finish on time at 14.00 and have all of my food on the plates at service time ( other than the broad beans, which I just could not be arsed to depod !  ) We then had to endure nearly a three and a half wait ( spent in The Eagle) whilst our food was tasted and Methods reviewed etc. This was an incredibly nerve racking period and resulted in us returning to school and awaiting our fate in the Dining Room all as nervous as hell.

Finally we were called back in the kitchen to our individual benches to see how our food had been dissected by the Tasters. Belinda – one of the School invigilators in my kitchen – quietly sided up to me and whispered I had passed – she explained my method would be discussed with me shortly but that she wanted to put me out of misery. I was absolutely elated and relieved 😌- could not believe that these 9 months had finally resulted in successfully completing my Practical to obtain my Diploma ! Phew ! Others were not so lucky – 2 out of 8 in my kitchen failed on the day, and from our class of 16 there were unfortunately 5 who failed for various reasons. These poor souls had to redo the exam on Friday morning on the day of our Graduation Party. The good news was that 4 from 5 retook the exam and passed, so we were only left with one Student who would not be getting their Diploma.

So then it was Graduation Party time, which took place off-site at The George IV pub in Chiswick. We were promised Burgers (?), 2 glasses of Champagne ( before paying for the rest of our drinks) and a live band. There was also prize giving for Overall Best Student, Best Marks in the Theory and Wine Exams, and Best Portfolios. Congratulations to the Winners , but Surprise, surprise no Prize for me , but I did find out my marks in the Theory and Wine Exams,  which I came in at 85% and 88% respectively, so was happy enough with that ! Beforehand Myself and 4 other classmates had a lunch at La Trompette around the corner to the party Venue which we thought was very appropriate seeing that our Tutor Michael had worked in their kitchens after his Leiths tuiton. The party was great fun, culminating in dancing to another band in the pub at around 12.30 before a bunch of us – Teachers as well – went Fine Dining at West Kebabs at 2AM ! What a wonderful way to end to my life at Leiths – to be with Michael and others in such refined surroundings  ! ( and good luck to David who will be heading off to Thailand soon, and Emma who also announced her departure from Leiths yesterday)

Leiths Diploma – Tick the box, What next …..