How mcuh is presentation for you when it comes to food?

Yes.

No

Yes, absolutely.

With that being said, I don't think yours was an issue of "presentation" per se.

A steak is consumed differently. I like my steak whole, because when you slice it up that way, it's going to cool down faster. If you ordered it medium-rare, it was barely warm to begin with, so by the time you get to the 4th bite, you're all but guaranteed to be eating cold food.

I don't think anyone could argue against the importance of presentation, though. Sure, when mom makes carne con papas, I don't care that it's just mush over rice and sauce all over.

When I'm paying $35 for a dish, I expect it to look neat, and be presented properly.

Yes BUT taste trumps everything by a very wide margin. IMO, good to great food can't help but look fantastic.

parsley I hope it was the curly one at least

quote:

Originally posted by marcb7:
No

If you ordered a steak at a steakhouse, where the ribeye was $60, and it came out with the juices all over the plate, half the steak sitting in the mashed potatoes, and the asparagus scattered all over the place, you wouldn't be disappointed?

I expect a clean and neat presentation in a restaurant. I just don't think g-man's case was "presentation" as much as it was "preparation".

quote:

Originally posted by Jorgerunfast:

quote:

Originally posted by marcb7:
No

If you ordered a steak at a steakhouse, where the ribeye was $60, and it came out with the juices all over the plate, half the steak sitting in the mashed potatoes, and the asparagus scattered all over the place, you wouldn't be disappointed?

I expect a clean and neat presentation in a restaurant. I just don't think g-man's case was "presentation" as much as it was "preparation".

Depends on how it was cooked/tasted really.

I prefer my steak whole when served, typically ask for my potato on the side and 86 the vege.

Id be much more disappointed if the plate looked like a piece of art but tasted like sh!t.

Sometimes the biggest difference between what I cook at home and what I get at a restaurant is just presentation. I want the food and garnish to look really good, and I want it served on nice tableware. That should be part of the cost of the food that's being passed on to me.

As Jorge mentioned earlier, though, slicing my meat isn't really "presentation." I want something more creative than that.

Presentation is pretty important to me.

quote:

Originally posted by Jorgerunfast:

quote:

Originally posted by marcb7:
No

If you ordered a steak at a steakhouse, where the ribeye was $60, and it came out with the juices all over the plate, half the steak sitting in the mashed potatoes, and the asparagus scattered all over the place, you wouldn't be disappointed?

I expect a clean and neat presentation in a restaurant. I just don't think g-man's case was "presentation" as much as it was "preparation".

my 60$ steak typically has nothing but a hunk of meat on a hot plate with juices and butter potentially flowing all over the place. ;-)

i dont know what this other "stuff" you floridians put on your steak plate is.

Agree . . . presentation is part of the purchase price at a restaurant.

I certainly put substance over style in this regard though so want the food to taste fantastic. But, sometimes poor presentation can just muck up the works and play with your mind a little to detract from what otherwise would have been a fantastic meal in terms of both taste and presentation.

quote:

Originally posted by g-man:

quote:

Originally posted by Jorgerunfast:

quote:

Originally posted by marcb7:
No

If you ordered a steak at a steakhouse, where the ribeye was $60, and it came out with the juices all over the plate, half the steak sitting in the mashed potatoes, and the asparagus scattered all over the place, you wouldn't be disappointed?

I expect a clean and neat presentation in a restaurant. I just don't think g-man's case was "presentation" as much as it was "preparation".

my 60$ steak typically has nothing but a hunk of meat on a hot plate with juices and butter potentially flowing all over the place. ;-)

i dont know what this other "stuff" you floridians put on your steak plate is.

Sounds like presentation, to me

Yes. It matters. But...

As others have said regarding steak- while there are specific, sauced, preparations I have had and loved at high end, non-specifically-steak restaurants, generally I like my steak served whole.

As to the broader point, presentation matters... but that doesn't mean that I always or even usually like tweezered dishes. If I'm in the mood for cassoulet or wild mushroom risotto or sole meuniere, I'm also most likely in the mood for food on a plate. Maybe a sprig of parsley, but that works with those dishes flavor-wise anyway. If I'm ordering a dish based upon more finesse or experimental cooking, I like there to be more artistry on the plate. Peasant food, even at fancy restaurants (Osso Bucco with a tomato-saffron sauce over porcini risotto) never much seems to benefit from art on the plate. But newer and "fancier" foods do take to it a little more. Again, that said, I actively do not like tweezered presentations, nor, frankly most "precious" food in general.

Presentation of food to me is similar to spelling and grammar in prose.

P Hickner

I do love a good presentation. That being said, I must admit that my presentation is the worst. I make some pretty decent food, but I just don't have any artistic flair when it comes to that. Sort of like a patron who loves art, but can't draw to save his life.

Reminds me of my father's parsley joke. Unfortunately, if I posted it, the thread would be shut down in a heart beat

quote:

Originally posted by mneeley490:
I do love a good presentation. That being said, I must admit that my presentation is the worst. I make some pretty decent food, but I just don't have any artistic flair when it comes to that. Sort of like a patron who loves art, but can't draw to save his life.

I have to admit, this is me too. Can't draw a straight line with a ruler... My plates are ugly. But the food usually tastes ok.

PH

quote:

Originally posted by DoktaP:
Reminds me of my father's parsley joke. Unfortunately, if I posted it, the thread would be shut down in a heart beat

Let 'er rip, Dok. It's a good thread, but it ain't that good!

PH

Competence is what matters. I'm pretty jaded by so many early presentations of image over substance. For decades, most of the "nicer" restaurants around here had everything from decor, menu and food presentation down to a wonderful facade, but the food was mediocre. Most customers were impressed. Don't know if they didn't know any better or were swayed by the image - probably both. Most of the best food was at no frills places.

Sacrificing the quality of the food for the sake of the visual is strictly amateur hour, not ready for prime time. You can work with a dish to present it better, but don't work against it.

I grill and serve a lot of hanger-steaks. The grain direction on those can be really tricky for an ordinary mook. I serve them cut into medallions on the plate, lightly sauced with a ramekin of au jus on the side. The only times they were ever sent back is when I didn't cut them first. The patron cut it wrong and then bitched that it was a bad tough steak.

Any steak that is tough when cut wrong is one I can skip. I'll take skirt steak over hanger steak any day.

quote:

Originally posted by Board-O:
Any steak that is tough when cut wrong is one I can skip. I'll take skirt steak over hanger steak any day.

i hear you on that one

Skirt and Flank can show tougher depending on how you slice it as well. Hanger steak is awesome if cooked properly, but I also love skirt steak.

Presentation is very important to me and we try to present food nicely even when we are casually cooking at home. That said, taste trumps all. Our one and only time at 11 Madison Park reminded me that just because it looks great, does not mean it tastes great. It seemed they were trying so hard to make things look cool, that they lost how ingredients are supposed to interact on a plate. Compare that to Le Bernardin where not only did everything look great, but it all worked together.

Glenn, I agree completely about taste trumping all. I didn;'t have as great an experience at Le Bernardin as you did. I saw skate on the menu but it came with a foie gras lentil sauce which just didn;t sound good to me, but I let the waiter talk me into it. The skate was perfect but I thought the sauce detracted from the dish. Enough, actually, that in retrospect, I should have sent it back.

quote:

Originally posted by GlennK:
Skirt and Flank can show tougher depending on how you slice it as well. Hanger steak is awesome if cooked properly, but I also love skirt steak.

+1

Have to agree with the folks who say taste trumps everything else. To some degree presentation matters, but it's way down the list. If someone just dumps everything into a bowl, that would probably irritate me, depending on where the place was - sometimes that's exactly what you order, but if the plate isn't garnished or the isn't wiped clean or the snow peas aren't lined up - I don't care about any of that.

Curious about the hangar steak though - what is it that you guys object to?

quote:

Originally posted by GregT:


Curious about the hangar steak though - what is it that you guys object to?

nothing wrong with it in my book,

i just prefer the skirt because of chinese stir fry.

if i want a chunk of meat, i alwasy go ribeye

alot of places also over marinate the hanger in my opinion

I learned about the hanger steak a few years ago when I was the chef for a butcher shoppe. We went over the top with them. After trimming them out we would hit them with a jaccard and then roll them around in a vacuum barrel in a "Black Forrest" marinade we had. They ended up being fork tender (too much for me) and lost a real steak texture in my opinion. However, my opinion be damned, we sold out every day (+/- 150lbs.) We even used any/all quality trim for burgers (80/85-20). Those sold out too. Now for me not having a grinder, I trim much closer. It takes more time, but still. I don't have enough good trim for more than a meat-ball. I throw them in a bowl with equal splashes olive oil and worcestershire sauce plus 1 teaspoon each of Weber Chicago Steak and Veggie Grill seasonings. I just roll everything around by hand and they sit in that until I'm done doing everything else and the grill is ready, 3-hours or less. Then it's grill, rest, cut and serve. No survivors from the plate.

I love hanger steak.

PH

quote:

Originally posted by g-man:

i just prefer the skirt because of chinese stir fry.

It's my go-to steak for stir-frying.

if i want a chunk of meat, i alwasy go ribeye

Agreed! Grilling one tonight.

alot of places also over marinate the hanger in my opinion

Too many better alternatives, IMO. There's a reason it's cheaper than skirt steak.

quote:

Originally posted by DoktaP:
Reminds me of my father's parsley joke. Unfortunately, if I posted it, the thread would be shut down in a heart beat

If we have the same joke in mind, it's a great one! ... but you'd also probably be right about this thread haha.

Nobody eats parsely!

Supply and demand. The United States has an ever increasing Hispanic population. Therein skirt-steak is more expensive than hanger. Nobody makes fajitas using hanger steak.

Hanger is more expensive and way harder to find than skirt around here. Wish I could find hanger more often.

Generally speaking, in comparison to regular nice expensive high profit steaks, hanger is a pain-in-the-ass to trim out. If you're really good, and have a grinder for the quality trim to make burgers, it's not so bad. But then, you've got smaller less attractive cuts of hanger. I'm not so fast and I trim very closely. My finished cut pieces are larger, but it takes me a longer time. Time is money (I wish I said that first), and you just can't charge rib-eye prices for hanger. Buying it bulk un-trimmed is a cheap deal. Prices of beef are higher now than I can remember though. For smaller shops on a tight budget, it's not always a a prime money maker. When I started with hanger it was less than $2.50/lb. We had someone trimming it out all day long for sale the next day. We would go through three(3) 50lb. boxes a day. Just last week I paid $4.49/lb. for any amount less than 50lbs. It's cheaper for 50lbs. or more.

On the hanger steak issue- I don't buy it to cook at home: skirt and flank and occasionally sirlion flap are the steaks of that nature I generally buy to cook myself. But I do like the steak and have had some wonderful preparations at restaurants.

quote:

Originally posted by Board-O:
Nobody eats parsely!

Meow.

quote:

Originally posted by steve8:

quote:

Originally posted by Board-O:
Nobody eats parsely!

Meow.

You guys are killing me!
Very funny Board-O. You've obviously heard it!

quote:

Originally posted by steve8:

quote:

Originally posted by Board-O:
Nobody eats parsely!

Meow.

You're a bad man

Interesting article in the NYTimes today by their restaurant critic. Your Eyes Are Happier Than Your Stomach

As I get older, I'd rather eat with my mouth than eyes.