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Men love with their eyes. Women, oddly enough, too, and do not believe those who will try to convince you otherwise. You yourself understand that you need to keep this in mind all the time if you want to turn a meal from mechanical chewing into something more. An act of love. From time to time, any housewife and any chef who love what they do and want the dish to look like not just food, but at least a little bit of a work of art, is engaged in decorating dishes. As a world renowned food decorating guru, I’ve decided to share with you a few tips based on my own experience.
General rule
Since Soviet times, some people still believe that if you want to get a beautiful dish, it is best to unleash your irrepressible imagination. As a result, we have animals, people, and absolutely incredible constructions made from food, the dwarf eggs of which are the most innocent imaginable. They call it “What a beauty!” and loudly admire, but in fact, truly beautiful food should first of all look like food that you want to eat. You can, of course, build some kind of animal in order to interest the child, who otherwise will not sit at the table, but you should not get too carried away with this. If you are cooking for adults, try to make it beautiful so that the first association at the sight of your dish is “food”, and not a gnome, tree or some other cat.
About parsley
Everyone knows a simple rule: if you want to decorate a dish, parsley is your best friend. It is affordable, looks beautiful, and has a recognizable taste, which is difficult to spoil something. For decoration, you can use both curly parsley and flat-leaved parsley. The first can be used to build a curly “bush” and hoist it in the center of the dish (or where appropriate), the second is used both as a whole and in crushed form. Fresh parsley, if not overused, always brings liveliness and appetizing appearance to the dish.
About schnitzel
Extremely beloved by the pros, but not much complimented by amateurs, chives, or chives, are the second (and possibly the first) universal means of decorating ready-made dishes. With a more delicate flavor than regular green onions, it allows you not to worry too much about interfering with the taste of the dish (but this, of course, does not mean that chives can be thoughtlessly added anywhere).
Deliberately carelessly thrown chives feathers, thin and graceful, will immediately add a kind of fragility, ephemeral airiness and freshness that inevitably appears with the addition of greenery to the appearance of the dish. The geometrically correct shape of the finely chopped chives also adds to the beauty of the dish. Finally, if you place the long chives feathers vertically or almost vertically, you can get something already from the haute cuisine series.
Everything else
If I do not write about other greens separately, this does not mean that they are not suitable for decoration. Thyme and rosemary will wonderfully decorate meat and other dishes with a “masculine” image, nothing better than dill and fennel greens has been invented to decorate the fish, obliquely chopped green onions are a sure sign that we are dealing with oriental cuisine, basil will probably fit in in general, everywhere, except for the most difficult dishes, and sage for decoration can be taken not only fresh, but also fried.
Heat treatment of greens before serving, by the way, is a separate topic, do not hesitate to experiment. Another obvious rule is that if you do not want eaters to try to eat those greens that you assume solely as decoration, make sure that your idea is clear without further ado. In other words, do not bury the rosemary branch in the bottom of the plate, but carefully lay / stick it on top or even on the edge.
Greens must be fresh
It is obvious. If slightly wilted greens are even more suitable in cooking, then decorating dishes with it will lead to a complete disaster. Sluggish greens can be chopped finely and finely and hope that no one will notice, but if it has already begun to turn yellow, it will be a full guard. If you have nothing but dried parsley, it is best not to decorate the dish at all. Of course, stalked celery leaves, for which yellow is quite normal, are one of the exceptions to this rule.
About color
This rule smoothly follows from the previous one: fresh greens have a rich green color, which is so beautiful, brings variety to the color scheme of the finished dish, etc., etc. There is, however, one trick that allows you to make green even greener: for this, the greens are subjected to a quick heat treatment – say, blanched. Blanched greens acquire a bright emerald color, but lose their shape, which, however, is sometimes also useful – with the help of blanched onions (chives, regular or leeks), you can make bundles of vegetables cut into strips, and in general you can tie anything you want.
Fine, fine as possible, even finer
If you decide to just sprinkle the finished dish with herbs, you can go in two different ways: either sprinkle it with whole leaves (say, in the case of parsley), or chop the herbs. Grinding does not mean “walk a couple of times with a knife.” It is impossible to overdo it here, even parsley chopped into green dust will give the dish the attractiveness of chaos and mystery, which cannot be said from the crooked and unevenly cut leaves. So try your best.
No stems
Returning to the topic of chopped greens, I will add – it is always about leaves, whether it be parsley, dill or something else. No stems, this is taboo. Leave them for broths or something else, as a last resort blanch and bandage something as above. There is nothing nastier than chunks of stems floating in a soup that has been sprinkled with herbs.
Do not regret welding
If you decide to decorate, do not be greedy. Combine several types of greenery so that it is clear where which one, and do not hesitate to “build Babylon”. Remember, a bush of two or three branches of curly parsley looks even more beautiful than a single branch, albeit very beautiful.
About geometry
Since we have agreed to abandon recognizable visual images (see cat), there are two ways left – either abstractionism or geometry, and a combination of both methods works best, as usual. Straight lines and curves are perfectly modeled with the same chives, and the geometric shape of a basil or sage leaf makes other hearts flutter no worse than before the first date.
By the way, since you have followed the “geometric” path, try to correlate the geometry of the greens with the geometry of serving the dish. An old post on creative serving will help you with this. These are the rules, which seem to be simple, but it took me a couple of years to understand and systematize them. Food is never too beautiful, even if it is eaten right now, so your advice on how you decorate dishes will certainly help both me and those who come to this page after you. Leave them in the comments!