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While writing up The Toronto Star in 60 Seconds, I was quite surprised to see that Kim Honey wrote in her DS piece:I also found it really aggravating that the whole program was predicated on the home cook using what chefs call mise en place, which means every ingredient has been prepped and measured out into little bowls before cooking begins. I know that's the way cooking schools teach you how to do it, but I have never met a home cook who thinks that way (unless they are obsessive-compulsive).
Is mise en place really something only for the cooks and obsessive-compulsive folks out there? To me, I always considered it a great idea that doesn't get utilized as often as it should. Heck, I don't always follow that rule, but when I do, I'm oh so happy for doing so. (Although sometimes I will do half-place as I call it -- breaking up the mise en place between steps, so when something is resting, heating, etc, I gather the next group of ingredients.)
Mise en place makes everything easier, even if it seems like a pain at first. It keeps you from rushing when steps go quicker than you anticipated, and best of all -- it makes sure you have ALL the ingredients before moving forward. Do you use mise en place? And do you find the practice to be aggravating or obsessive compulsive?
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12-31-2008 @10:12AM Astin said... I don't use it nearly enough, but when I do, I'm happy I did. I'm always slower than I'd like to be with prep, which can really hurt a meal when then onions are sweated before you expect them to be and the zucchini still isn't washed. Also, the times where you discover you don't have as much milk as you thought and the butter is already melted aren't any fun at all.
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12-31-2008 @10:13AM david said... I pretty much always mise en place, and my wife often does. But we would also be dangerously close to the OC category. I find it so much easier. I'm less likely to forget something and if there is a step that is time sensitive, I don't get thrown off by having to prep the next ingredients.
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12-31-2008 @10:18AM Biscuit Butcher said... Personally, I was classically trained to always Mise En Place and I have found that this has carried over well into my personal cooking experiences. More often than not I also engage in what you refer to as Half-Place (love the term by the way) however just due to the fact that it streamlines the work quite a bit. I always get my ingredients out before hand though, even if I don't mince and measure at the time just to make sure that I have enough of everything. It takes a lot of the hassle and hair-pulling out of cooking. Especially when I don't have to worry about hitting up the market halfway through a recipe. However, it should be noted that some things should not be mise en placed until the last minute due to the constraints of the ingredient. For example, I wouldn't slice up and dice my apples ahead of time due to the fact that they would brown too quickly, especially if I wanted to avoid treating them with lemon juice or something similar because I wanted to avoid the taste. I feel like with mise en place, you have to know what your are making but I definitely feel like it has helped me out a lot in the past.
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12-31-2008 @10:25AM Irina said... Depends a lot on what I happen to be cooking: for Chinese food definitely because there's simply no time to cut up things while the oil is hot, for a slap-up meal never (though I may go through the fridge and the larder and put some stuff on the counter which I use some or all of). When cooking a normal daily meal, planning everything in careful steps would give it much too much importance so I'd feel that I couldn't afford to have it go wrong; whereas when I don't plan I can change it on the fly and it's almost always right.
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12-31-2008 @10:51AM Rob O. said... Even as a rank amateur, I try to prep my ingredients before beginning, but honestly, I often don't have enough prep bowls to completely do so. And since my kitchen is small, it can be difficult to make room to have everything out all at once. It sure does make everything come together easier tho.
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12-31-2008 @10:59AM Bob S. said... I'm a home cook and never thought of myself as obsessive/compulsive. Forgetful ? Yup.
Mise en place is my assurance that everything gets into the dish and that I'm not chopping like a maniac while something burns "because I forgot".
Common sense to me.
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12-31-2008 @11:20AM sillyLN said... As someone who works long hours (and often arrives home already hungry for dinner) I find that prepping all the vegetables, meat, and spice mixes in the morning before leaving for work allows me to actually have a home-cooked dinner rather than deciding to eat out. A few exceptions to my morning prep are: spice mixes with less than 4 spices, mincing garlic or ginger, measuring out butter/oil, flour, sugar. The prospect of coming home to mise-en-place greatly reduces my stress during the work day.
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1-02-2009 @10:22AM rebecca said... I almost always "mise"...especially when I am expecting company and want to impress them with how effortless the meal seems to come together. But seriously, getting the prep out of the way makes a huge difference in my cooking. Ingredients are rarely forgotten and, as somone already mentioned, it's a lot easier to follow the steps of a recipe without things getting ahead of themselves (onions burning, etc).
As for the extra dishes that get dirtied in the process, I tend to use a big, flat plate (or two) to stage my piles of julienned veg and a smaller plate for garlic, ginger, herbs, etc. I tend not to pre-measure liquid ingredients unless they are all going into a marinade, dressing, or sauce that I can combine in a cup or bowl....but I will go as far as hauling all of the bottles out of the cupboard/fridge before I start cooking.
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12-31-2008 @11:25AM bcurran said... Is there specific bowls or sets for mise en place? I agree with the one comment above, I don't have enough little bowls to do mise en place. I would like to do it more often though. What do you suggest is a good size bowl to use that does not take up much space?
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12-31-2008 @11:49AM Christi said... I don’t have bowls for mise en place so I just use whatever is handy -- cups, small bowls, ramekins, plates, etc. Often times, I'll combine ingredients into one larger bowl or cup if I know the recipe will call for them to be mixed later.
The way I see it, if a working chef who cooks for 8-hour shifts with multiple orrders coming in at the same time -- an environment where there's no room for mistakes -- uses a technique, that technique probably goes a long way towards efficiency.
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12-31-2008 @12:02PM leavesofjoy said... I always do a mise before I start cooking. It's part of how my mom taught me to cook, and it's one of the most valuable things she taught me.
I use a lot of ramekins, I watch for them at garage sales and thrift shops, they are rarely more than $1 each.
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12-31-2008 @12:38PM miss h said... i've been mise en placing for years before i even knew what it was - just recently learned it was a staple of the culinary world in cooking school - but i love it. i always mise en place, even if i'm just doing a simple box mix lol :) it is much easier, and it makes everything come together so much faster when all of the ingredients are already pre-portioned out for you. oh yeah, and i'm also seriously OCD when it comes to baking :)
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1-13-2009 @10:17AM miss h said... also - Ikea is a great place to pick up mise en place bowls. they make small plastic bowls that can hold 5-6 ounce portions - perfect for seasonings, herbs, etc :)
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12-31-2008 @12:55PM TD said... I always mise, it just habit. Yes at school it's been drilled into my head but honestly it's something I've always done. It just makes things go easier. And you really don't have to use little bowls are whatever - it's nice but not a requirement.
I have some tiny bowls that I use, but if I run out I use whatever I can get my hands on. Tupperware - or anything of that nature works well too.
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12-31-2008 @1:03PM LeisureGuy said... I use mise en place occasionally, especially on complex and/or new recipes. The "half mise" also works well for me. When I don't use it, unless the recipe is quite simple and familiar, I generally wish I had.
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12-31-2008 @2:13PM Gretchen Roberts said... Mise en place with completely-prepped ingredients in cute little bowls smacks of TV cooking to me. I do plenty of prep work, number one being reading the recipe all the way through before starting (an oft-forgotten step!), but don't line everything up in bowls. For me it's about maximizing the ease of prep but also of washing up afterwards.
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12-31-2008 @2:20PM Jena said... When I prepare dishes like stir-fries or soups, I do. With baking, not so much; I don't have the space on the counter for that many dishes + my mixer. Besides, as has already been pointed out--the more dishes I can reuse, the fewer I have to wash in the end.
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12-31-2008 @2:28PM LinC said... I agree with Gretchen. Doing mise en place with cute little bowls is much too Food Network. Yes, I check that I have all the ingredients before starting a recipe. I do prep work like chopping nuts or dismembering the chicken. But why pre-measure ingredients that you are just going to dump into a bowl? Not worth my time. I'm not an FN star who has to finish multiple recipes within 30 minutes.
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12-31-2008 @2:33PM stacey said... Depends on what I am cooking & the amount of space available. Plus how many clean bowls or other containers I have available. I might cut up the veggies ahead of time but wait until I'm cooking to measure out the spices, or measure them all out into one bowl. You'll never see me with more than 3-5 containers of pre measured or pre chopped stuff because I have no place to put it.
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12-31-2008 @2:38PM manraysky said... Gretchen, my thoughs exactly. I cooked in restaurants for years and never lined up all my ingredients in little matching bowls. That seems SO Food Network to me, like "this is how the pros do it!"
I check to make sure I have everything I need, then just start cooking, prepping as I go.
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