Comprehensive reading Corn (Maize)

Corn or maize was domesticated and cultivated by the native people of the New World when Christopher Columbus first reached its shores.

The cultivation of corn was of primary importance to the daily diet of the Indians, who used it in making a sort of bread, the tortilla.

Columbus took the seeds back to Spain in 1493, but the cultivation of corn began in Europe only around 1520. It was regarded primarily as a garden plant, but in the 16th century it became a culinary fixture and was used to make white and sweet bread — polenta. It was cooked in a mass, then cut with a wire into large, thin slices and arranged on a platter with cheese or with butter. Corn was extensively consumed by poor people because they were primarily concerned with filling their empty bellies.

In the United States, the cereal is almost always called corn, while in Britain it is called maize. Maize, variously spelled, is the cereal’s proper name in all European languages. The word is derived from the Spanish maize, taken in turn from the Indian maize. Polenta eventually replaced all of the other cereals and provided nourishment for many generations of poor working people in the countries of the Mediterranean Basin, the Balkans, Africa and Asia.

Nowadays there are a lot of different kinds of polenta and other dishes made with corn in recipe books.

You should know this

1. service plate

2. soup bowl

3. napkin

4. bread and butter plate with butter knife

5. water glass

6. white wine glass

7. red wine glass

8. fish fork

9. dinner fork

10. salad fork

11. service knife

12. fish knife

13. soup spoon

14. dessert spoon and cake fork

1. brandy glass 2. red wine glass

3. white wine glass 4. all champagne glass (tulip flute)

5. low champagne glass (saucer) 6. martini glass

Lesson 3 MY SPECIAL FIELD 1 year 2 term

My Profession Is a Cook

If you study for example, at the Cooking Department, you will be a cooking and catering professional: a cook or a technologist.

Every school year you will do practice work for 2—3 months. Let's study the practice at a restaurant. It will be a large restaurant and it will be open 24 hours a day.

There are three departments within the main shop there — a cold shop, a hot shop and a pastry-cook’s shop. Salads, snacks, sandwiches, cuts of cold meat and fish and desserts are made in the cold shop. Soups, hot meat and fish dishes and sauces are prepared in the hot shop. In the pastry-cook’s shop they make tarts, patties, fancy cakes, etc.

The kitchen staff begin their work at 7 o’clock. Student cooks will have to come to the restaurant at 10 o’clock. Each of them will be told to go to one of the shops. There they will be given some tasks for the working day. Usually student cooks prepare sandwiches, fruit salads and canapes for breakfast. They cut bread, ham, sausage and vegetables to put on canapes. Student cooks also decorate, them with herbs and little figures made of carrots, cucumbers, tomatoes, etc. Breakfast is usually served from 8 till 12. At 11 o’clock students begin to help the cooks by preparing dishes for lunch. Student cooks are usually trusted to cut vegetables and make sauces for desserts: strudels, ice cream, tarts and puddings.

All day student cooks have to carry out cooks’ instructions. The kitchen staff are very experienced there. The chef should be a very skilled cook. The main part of his job is to plan the menu for the day and manage the staff in the kitchen.

At the end of the practice time student cooks usually have to take an examination. They must prepare three courses: soup, a main course and dessert.

The practice gives a lot of useful information, it provides student cooks with an experience. You can realize that you have made the right choice.