Second Course

L'Academie faculty members Patrice Olivon, Francois Dionot (the school's founder) and Michel Pradier during a critique of a meal put together by student Micah Goring. (Veronika Lukasova)

"The school is a Club Med," Olivon declares. "They're going to be going to their externships for six months" -- the last stage of the program involves an apprenticeship in a "real" kitchen -- "and it's going to be a shock." And then he echoes a frequent refrain about the horrors of a chef's temper: "They have to expect that they're not going to be good enough no matter what they do. It's not that you're going to make a custard and you're done. [Sometimes] you're going to make it under pressure, without the right tools, when the chef is yelling at you."

The program actually seems less Club Med than boot camp (albeit one with quiche on the menu). Goring's classmate, Vaughn Vogel, 33, a former paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne Division, finds a loose parallel to the military in that "there's a rite of passage or initiation in the culinary world where they try to test your mettle and prepare you." Sometimes, he adds, "there's talk in class about 'Going to the walk-in.' People go cry in the walk-in [refrigerator] and come back out" once they've calmed down.

Much of the drama takes place in the classroom's adjacent kitchen, a large room filled with rectangular work stations and a long row of industrial ovens, where on this cold, rainy morning the students labor in near-silent intensity. With two hours left to create his team's extravagant meal, Goring pulls a pot off the stove. It's filled with coffee beans floating in barbecue sauce, which will go with the duck. He's nervous about today, he says, tasting the mixture with a plastic spoon. "Last week we overcooked the tenderloin."

The Market Basket competition is part of the culinary arts program's Phase II, advanced kitchen training. Phase I is a 12-week crash course in the basics of searing, braising, grilling and stewing, along with knife skills, pastry techniques and sanitation -- an intense elementary education where Goring says, "everything that can go wrong did go wrong." According to Francois Dionot, L'Academie's founder, "It's like learning the notes on the piano before playing the music. Imagination and creativity, that's for later."

This second 12-week phase emphasizes speed and restaurant-style service. Three days a week, the class watches a two-hour demonstration by their teacher, and then each student cooks the same, usually quite elaborate, three-course menu, always posted in French. Friday's Market Basket is the students' primary creative outlet.

The final phase involves the six-month externship, where the students work full time in a real kitchen, including some of the best in the area, thanks in part to the school's well-connected staff. They'll earn about $10 an hour -- which by many accounts is realistic beginning pay in the industry. Lee already works nights at Citronelle, where he will later do his externship; others will end up at the Inn at Little Washington, the Blue Duck Tavern, Palena.

Despite the endless emphasis here on the downsides of the profession -- "The pay isn't great," notes admissions director Barbara Cullen. "You toil for a long time, and somebody else [the chef] gets the credit." -- the culinary arts program has doubled in size over the past few years. It's offered four times a year now instead of two, graduating 100 students a year, each of whom forks over about $26,000 in tuition.

It helps that these students know they'll be in demand when they graduate, because of the widely bemoaned lack of skilled kitchen workers to staff Washington's ever-burgeoning restaurant scene. Nora Pouillon, founder of Restaurant Nora, acknowledges she's started recruiting from other parts of the country to fill key positions and praises L'Academie's culinary education as "the best in the area." Considering the talent shortage, Pouillon says, "I take any interns that want to come."

FUTURE EMPLOYMENT IS FAR FROM ANYONE'S MIND RIGHT NOW, HOWEVER. It's 12:30, and time's up. First-course plates are rushed into the classroom next door, and teams 1 through 8 line up their dishes along the demonstration counter, which sits below a set of mirrors to reflect the countertop's goings-on. Goring and Lee are fourth to be judged, their order chosen earlier from a pack of number cards. Not bad, Goring says of the placement, but "usually they're nicer in the beginning."

They seem to be: The judges are Dionot, Olivon, and Cedric Maupillier, chef at Central Michel Richard and here as a guest. The students sit or stand quietly, watching the three wielding their forks, tasting each dish of each course thoughtfully then pronouncing their verdicts in turn. The judges nearly swoon over Team 1's steak with cherry bourbon sauce: Dionot says, "the balance of sweet, salt, sour, etc., is perfect."

But it's not Goring's day. Comments on the duck confit salad include: "It doesn't do anything for me . . . The crepe is too wet . . . The duck is dry." And later, about the flank steak course: "The mashed potato is watery," says Maupillier, arms crossed. "It's not really my kind of thing." Olivon says that the bacon is overcooked.

The dessert, at least, passes muster: The caramel cage is a pretty touch.

Goring's reaction is respectful, offering a "Thank you, chef," for every critique.

He's been accepted for his hoped-for externship, at Monocacy Crossing in Frederick, a casual-chic restaurant beloved by local foodies and wine enthusiasts that boasts "comfortable food" along the lines of "garlic- and herb-topped beef medallions wrapped with applewood-smoked bacon."

Goring is able to start working there on weekends, before the full-time stint officially begins. Though he's often consigned to prep work and making only $8 an hour, he finds, gratefully, that the chef, Rich Regan, is nothing like the ogres he's been told to expect. "Chef Regan has really taken time to explain everything that's going on," Goring says, adding enthusiastically, "We made mozzarella. I'd never done that before."

He expects to graduate in June, hopes to own his own restaurant someday and, despite all the grim warnings, has few doubts about his chosen career so far. "It's the perfect balance of hard physical activity. It's mentally challenging. I don't really know how to put it in words actually . . . There's something about it. It just kind of gets ahold of you."

Christina Ianzito is a frequent contributor to the Magazine. She can be reached at christinaianzito@yahoo.com.