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Food: Presentation
May. 19th, 2008 09:39 amI'm sorry to have missed a couple of days. I'll do my best to catch up quickly. Consider this Friday's post.
One of the things that setting my self as enough of an expert to write about food has done, is make me realize how much I don't know and what areas I find particularly lacking in my own cookery.
Presentation tops that list. I never remember to sprinkle the finely chopped parsley over the plate. I always serve my sauces separately (I figure some people may not like much, some people may not be allergic to the meat but are to an ingredient in the sauce...) so nothing is plated on a bed of three coulis. Many of my key recipes are soups or stews and I'll have people hold their plates while I serve from the stove and then go out and find a place at the table. I'd never win Iron Chef because I'd lose the five points for plating every time.
However, in talking to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
siderea on Saturday night, and can I just say how nice it was that she was willing to come hang out at a train station for two hours to talk, she pointed out that simple presentation didn't mean it was necessarily poor presentation.
The other thing I realized during our talk is that I do some things instinctively. There was a Saveur magazine recipe for venison with three pureed vegetables served on the side a few years ago. When I finally decided to make it, I chose to substitute one of the suggested vegetables with carrots and I chose not to puree the lentils. For me the uniformity of texture and the lack of variety in the colors was a show stopper. I changed the show. It was a great meal, and, as usual, I served everything other than the salad and the dessert from the stove in the kitchen.
If anyone wants to learn the formal arts of presentation, more power to you. Can you come and help me some time? But for most of us, have dishware and glassware you find attractive and makes the food stand out. Don't be afraid of cooking because you can't make it look like something in a restaurant. I've been to a few restaurants where the food looked wonderful and tasted like cardboard.
One of the things that setting my self as enough of an expert to write about food has done, is make me realize how much I don't know and what areas I find particularly lacking in my own cookery.
Presentation tops that list. I never remember to sprinkle the finely chopped parsley over the plate. I always serve my sauces separately (I figure some people may not like much, some people may not be allergic to the meat but are to an ingredient in the sauce...) so nothing is plated on a bed of three coulis. Many of my key recipes are soups or stews and I'll have people hold their plates while I serve from the stove and then go out and find a place at the table. I'd never win Iron Chef because I'd lose the five points for plating every time.
However, in talking to
siderea on Saturday night, and can I just say how nice it was that she was willing to come hang out at a train station for two hours to talk, she pointed out that simple presentation didn't mean it was necessarily poor presentation.The other thing I realized during our talk is that I do some things instinctively. There was a Saveur magazine recipe for venison with three pureed vegetables served on the side a few years ago. When I finally decided to make it, I chose to substitute one of the suggested vegetables with carrots and I chose not to puree the lentils. For me the uniformity of texture and the lack of variety in the colors was a show stopper. I changed the show. It was a great meal, and, as usual, I served everything other than the salad and the dessert from the stove in the kitchen.
If anyone wants to learn the formal arts of presentation, more power to you. Can you come and help me some time? But for most of us, have dishware and glassware you find attractive and makes the food stand out. Don't be afraid of cooking because you can't make it look like something in a restaurant. I've been to a few restaurants where the food looked wonderful and tasted like cardboard.
