Food Presentation

Until this point, most of the focus of this book has been on the preparation of food, from the selection of ingredients through mise en place and final cooking. We still have not reached our final goal, however. The point of learning and practicing procedures to prepare food of high quality is to ensure the food is eaten and enjoyed.

In other words, our work isn’t done until the food we have prepared is arranged on plates or platters and ready to be presented to the diner.

In traditional classical cuisine, until well after the middle of the twentieth century, the normal practice in fine dining establishments was to send the food on platters and in casseroles and other serving dishes to the dining room, where it would be transferred to dinner plates by the serving staff, sometimes after carving or portioning. The chefs who developed nouvelle cuisine, however, wanted to control the appearance of the food down to the last detail and so began to arrange food on dinner plates in the kitchen. Since that time, many styles of plating have come and gone, as chefs have devoted much attention to the appearance and arrangement of food on dinner plates.