Howdy folks, how was your day? Have you started preparing for Christmas? It's just in less than 10 days but I am not feeling the Christmas vibes yet, probably because I am still in school.
I am still in school despite getting down with my exam for more than a week now, that's because I have some unfinished business in school. We recently hatched some new fishes which require intense care, so most of us are still sticking around to take care of them.
Yesterday, I talked about having a busy day that made me not be active here, I planned on staying home throughout today to have enough rest but it seems the farm manager in school had other plans.
My classmate called me later at night and said the farm manager said I should come to school as early as 7am today to come help in harvesting and preparing some fishes that are to be smoked-dry.
One of my professors is having his inaugural lecture on Thursday (tomorrow), so he said we should smoke-dry some fish for him which will be given to VIPs (like the VC) during the event.
It was short notice so I told my classmate I will be there by 8am. I arrived at school today at about 8am and I met them washing the fish that are to be smoke-dried. When the lecturer in charge of the processing arrived, we started preparing the ingredients and the oven for smoking.
Down to business
The first thing we did after making sure the fishes have been washed properly is to prepare the ingredients. We got ground pepper, seasoning cubes, curry, and salt.
All the ingredients were poured into a bowl. My lecturer was asking us to go get a spoon to mix the whole thing, but I just used my hands to do it. I always made sure to remember not to scratch my eyes or something with my hands, so I wouldn't end up putting pepper into my eyes 😆
While I was mixing the ingredients, my other classmates were preparing the oven. We made use of charcoal which was added to the bottom section of the oven, from there heat will travel to all sections.
After the oven has been set, then it's time to prepare the fish. The fishes were placed in a bowl and the ingredients were sprinkled on both sides of all the fishes. One group was applying the ingredients to the fish while the other groups were placing them in the oven.
We finished placing the whole thing into the oven at about 11am. Our lecturer said they will be ready at about 5pm or 6pm so we all left and I went into the farmhouse where I started interacting with users here.
After a while, I slept off and completely forgot about the fishes in the oven 😆 but at least my classmates were around. I woke later at about 3pm and I quickly ran to the processing unit to see what was going on.
I met my classmates removing the already smoked fish from the oven, it seems my lecturer was wrong about the timing. @Methion was the one removing the fishes one by one from the trays of the oven and placing them in a bowl, it was hell for him 😆.
A lot of the fishes (especially those at the bottom tray closest to the source of heat) were burnt badly. After removing the whole thing from the oven, we called the professor to come give us directions on how to package them.
Before he arrived, we separated the bad-looking ones from the good ones. When the professor came, he said we shouldn't package them now and we should do it tomorrow, so he should we should go keep the fish in his car that he is taking it home.
When he left, we shared some of the bad-looking ones among ourselves, mostly the ones that aren't badly burnt. There were very tasty, all thanks to the ingredient we applied to them.
Some of my classmates will be going to the professor's house tomorrow morning to package the fish but I won't be going with them, tomorrow will be my day off as I plan to stay home all day, I just hope someone else doesn't call me in tomorrow.
At the very least, I am very grateful for today's experience and I don't regret going to school. This is the first time that I am smoke-drying fish, all I have heard before were just theories but seeing it done with my eyes is a whole different experience, and it's a lot better than a thousand theories.
If I am called tomorrow to come smoke-dry some fish, I can comfortably do it now just from this one experience I have had today. This is the reason why I always prefer hands-on practical learning, I tend to learn faster and better that way and it's also the same with a lot of people, or don't you agree?
Thanks for reading 💖💖💖
Wednesday December 15, 2021
This fish looking great mehn. Like where do you all take them to after the packaging?