I am only volunteering in Production Kitchen for one day a week in November. That's because it is now getting close to the exam date (which is 17 November) and I feel I really need extra time to study for it (which basically means memorising recipes and baking processes, plus some extra baking practice).
Today I spent nearly all of my time in production kitchen assembling demo and prac boxes. Nothing special there. Towards the end of my shift, I did get to learn some cuisine basics - I learnt to make bechamel sauce. Milk and cream, infused with onion, cloves and bay leaves, then cooked with the roux, which is butter and plain flour, then seasoned with salt and white pepper at the end. It was not hard at all.
I really enjoy learning about French cuisine in the production kitchen, but I don't think I would want to do the Cuisine courses here at LCB Ottawa, because I cannot see how I could cope with the pressure of a cuisine kitchen. I have seen what things are like for the cuisine students (e.g. chefs yelling at students in the cuisine practical kitchen to simulate what happens in a real-life cuisine kitchen), and I simply prefer the gentler pace of the pastry kitchen, where the chefs don't really yell at anyone. :)
