BUFFET PRESENTATION
COLD FOOD PRESENTATION AND BUFFET SERVICE
> The buffet is a popular and profitable form of food presentation found in nearly every kind of food service operation. There are at least three reasons for this popularity:
Visual Appeal
Efficiency
Adaptability
BUFFET ARRANGEMENT AND APPEARANCE
> It's the greatest attraction for the customer. Eye appeal of food is always important. A buffet is not just a food service - it is food display.
LAVISHNESS AND ABUNDANCE
> a buffet should look lavish and plentiful.
There are many ways to create this look:
Color
Height
Full platters and bowls
Proper spacing
SIMPLICITY
> This sounds like a contradiction to the lavishness principle, but it is not. You need to strike a good balance between the two.
Overdesigned, over decorated food scares people away from eating it. How many times have you heard someone say, "oh it's so pretty i don't want to touch it? Even if they don't say it, they'll think it. Sometimes is so over decorated that it is no longer looks like food. The customer should at least be able to identify the food for what it is.
Excessive garnish is quickly destroyed as customers take portions.
ORDERLINESS
> A buffet should look like it was planned, not like it just happened. Customers prefer food presentations that look carefully done, not just thrown together.
Simple arrangements are much easier to keep neat and orderly than are complicated designs.
Colors and shape should look lively and varied, but make sure they go together and do not clash.
Keep the style consistent. it it's formal then everything should be formal. If it's casual or rustic then every part of the presentation should be casual or rustic.
MENU AND SERVING SEQUENCE
> Practical reasons as well as visual appeal determine the order in which foods are arranged on the buffet. As far as possible, it is good to have items in the proper menu order (example, appetizers first, main course afterward, desserts last) if only to avoid confusing the customers, who might otherwise wonder what the food is and how much they should take.
Hot food are best served last
The more expensive foods are usually placed after the less expensive items. This gives you some control of food cost.
Sauces and dressings should be placed next to the items with which they are to be served.
A separate dessert table is often a good idea. This allows guests to make a separate trip for dessert without interfering with the main serving line.
Plates of course, must be the first items on the table.
THE COCKTAIL BUFFET - AN EXCEPTION
> The cocktail buffet displays the appetizers intended to accompany drinks and other refreshments at receptions, cocktail parties and cocktail hours preceding banquets and dinners. There is no serving line. There is a separate line for each item.
Only appetizer-type foods are served: tasty, well-seasoned foods in small portions.
Stacks of small plates are placed beside each item rather than at the beginning of the table.
The table or tables must be easy to get to from all parts of the room and must not block traffic. Do not place them next to the entry because guests gather around them, blocking movement into and out of the room.
COLD PLATTER PRESENTATION
> The cold platter is the mainstay of the buffet and offers the most opportunity for visual artistry. It also can be one of the most demanding forms of food presentation, particularly in the case of show platters, which require great precision, patience and artistic sense. Cold platters can range from a simple tray of cold cuts to elaborate constructions of pates, meats, poultry or fish decorated with aspic, truffles, and vegetable flowers.
BASIC PRINCIPLES OF PLATTER PRESENTATION
The three elements of a buffet platter:
> Centerpiece or Grosse piece (gross pyess)
> The slices or serving portions of the main food item, arranged artistically
> The garnish, arranged artistically, in proportion to the cut slices
The food should be easy to handle and serve, so one portion can be removed without ruining the arrangement.
A simple design is best. Simple arrangements are easier to serve, more appetizing than overworked food, and more likely to be still attractive when they are half demolished by the guests.
Attractive platter presentation may be made on silver or other metals, mirrors, China, plastic, wood, or many other materials, as long as they are presentable and suitable for use for food.
Once a piece of food has touched the tray, do not remove it. Shiny silver or mirror trays are easily smudged.
Think of the platter as part of the whole buffet.
DESIGNING THE PLATTER
Plan Ahead
Plan for movement in your design
Give the design a focal point
Keep items in proportion
Let the guest see the best side of everything
CHEESE PLATTERS
> Cheese trays are popular on both luncheon buffets as a main course item and on dinner buffets as a dessert item. Cheeses are presented much differently than the other cold buffet foods .
A NOTE ON SANITATION
> Cold food for buffets presents a special sanitation problem. This is because the food spends a great deal of time out refrigeration while it is being assembled and decorated and again while it sits on the buffet. For this reason, it is particularly important to follow all the rules of safe food handling.
HOT FOODS FOR BUFFET
> Everything we have learned about the preparation and holding of hot foods in quantity applies to hot foods for buffets. Hot items are nearly always served from chafing dishes, which may be ornate silver affairs or simple way cold cold foods can.
MENU PSYCHOLOGY
> A menu is one of the important aspects for the success of any food service establishment. The word menu comes from French meaning "a detailed list".
Purpose of the Menu
> Inform guests of items available and price
> Inform employees of items to prepare and purchase
> Menu is primary control tool for the operation
> Menu is critical to communicating and selling items to the customer
Menu Forms and Functions
> Menus must be planned for the people eating the food. This sounds like a simple rule, but it is frequently forgotten. You must never forget that the customer is the main reason for being in business.
> In most operations the taste and preferences of the cooks or chefs are of little importance when planning the menu. The taste and preferences of the clientele must be given top priority if the business is to succeed.
THE CLIENTELE
Type of Institution
Hotels must provide a variety of services for their guests from budget-minded tourists to business people on expense accounts from breakfast and sandwich counters to elegant dining rooms and banquet halls
Hospitals must satisfy the dietary needs of the patients.
Schools must consider the ages of the students and their tastes and nutritional needs.
Employee food services menus that offer substantial but quickly served reasonably priced food for working customers.
Catering and banquet operations depend on menus that are easily prepared for large numbers but lavish enough for parties and special occasions.
Fast-food and take out quick service operations require limited menus featuring inexpensive , easily prepared, easily served foods for people in a hurry.
Full service restaurants range from simple neighborhood diners to expensive, elegant restaurants.
Customer Preferences
> Even facilities with captive audiences such as school cafeterias and hospital kitchens, must produce food that is appealing to their customers and in sufficient variety to keep them from getting bored with the same old things.
Kind of Meal
> Menus vary not only by kind of operations but by meal as well.
BREAKFAST
> Breakfast menus are fairly standard within any one country. In Europe or North America for example, a restaurant has to offer the usual selection of fruits, juices, eggs, cereals, breads, pancakes, waffles, breakfast meats and regional specialties because this is what customers want and expect In addition, featuring one or two unusual items in the menu such as an English muffin topped with creamed crabmeat and a poached egg, a special kind of country ham or an assortment of freshly made fruit sauces or syrup for the pancakes and waffles. Breakfast menus must feature foods that can be prepared quickly and can be eaten in a hurry.
LUNCH
The following factors are important to consider when planning lunch menus:
Speed
> Like breakfast customers, luncheon diners are usually in a hurry. They are generally working people who have a limited time to eat. Foods must be prepared quickly and be easy to serve and eat.
Simplicity
> Menu selections are fewer and fewer courses are served, in many case customers select only one course. Luncheon specials-combination of two or three items, such as soup and a sandwich or omelet and salad offered at a single price, satisfy the need for simplicity and speed.
Variety
> In spite of the shortness of the menu and the simplicity of the selections, luncheon menus must have variety. This is because many customers eat at the same restaurant several times a week or even everyday.
DINNER
> Dinner is usually the main meal and is eaten in a more leisurely than either breakfast or lunch. Of course some people in a hurry in the evening too but in general people come to a restaurant to relax over a substantial meal. Dinner menus offer more selections and more courses.
TYPES OF MENUS
Static Menus
> A static menu is one that offers the same dishes everyday. This menus are used in restaurants and other establishments where the clientele changes daily or where enough items are listed on the menu to offer sufficient variety. A static menu may be in place indefinitely or it may change at regular intervals, such as every season, every month or even every week.
Cycle Menus
> A cycle menu is one that changes everyday for a certain period, after this period the daily menus repeat in the same order. For example, a seven-day cycle menu has a different menu everyday for a week and repeats each week.
A la Carte Menu
> An ala carte menu is one in which individual item is listed separately, with it's own price. The customer makes selections from the various courses and side dishes to make up a meal.
Table d'Hote Menu
> Table d'hote (tobble dote) originally meant a fixed menu with no choices., like a meal you would be served if you were invited to someone's home for dinner. The term has also come to mean a menu that offers a selection of complete meals at set prices.
Menu d' Gustation
> A tasting menu is offered in addition to the regular menu and gives patrons a chance to try a larger number of the chef's creations. This menu may feature 5 or 6 or even as many as 10 or 12 individual courses served in small portions.
BUILDING THE MENU
> A course is a food or group of foods, served at one time or intended to be eaten at the same time. In a restaurant, the courses are normally served in sequence, allowing enough time for each to be eaten before the next is served. In a cafeteria the customers may select all their courses at once like appetizer, salad, main dish, and vegetables and dessert for example but eat it in a particular order.
THE CLASSICAL MENU
> Today's menus are descendants of elaborate banquet menus served in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. These menus had 12 or more courses and the sequence in which they were served was well established by tradition.
Cold hors d' oeuvre small savory appetizers
Soup clear soup, thick soup or broth
Hot hors d' oeuvre small hot appetizers
Fish any seafood item
Main course or Piece de Resistance, a large cut of roasted or braised meat, usually beef, lamb, venison with elaborate vegetable garnishes.
Hot entree individual portions of meat or poultry, broiled, braised or pan-fried etc.
Cold entree cold meats poultry, fish, and so on.
Sorbet a light ice or Sherbet, sometimes made of wine to refresh the appetite before the next course.
Roast usually roasted poultry , accompanied by or followed by a salad.
Vegetable usually a special vegetable preparation such as artichokes or asparagus or a more unusual vegetable such as cardoons.
Sweet what we call dessert - cakes and tarts , pudding, souffles etc.
Dessert fruit and cheese and sometimes small cookies or petit fours.
MODERN MENUS, COURSES AND ARRANGEMENT
> Such extensive classical menu are rarely served today. The main dish is the centerpiece of the modern meal. If the meal consists of only one dish it is considered the main course, even it is salad or a bowl of soup. There is usually only one main course , although banquets may still have more than one, such as a poultry dish followed by a meat dish.
The Modern Menu
First courses: Cold appetizer and/or Salad, warm appetizer and/or Soup
Main dishes: Meat, Poultry or Fish, Vegetable accompaniment
Dessert dishes: Sweets, fruits and cheeses
VARIETY AND BALANCE
> Balancing a menu means providing enough variety and contrast for the meal to hold interest from the first course to the last. To balance a menu you must develop a feeling for which foods complement each other or provide pleasing contrasts. And you must avoid repeating flavors and textures as much as possible.
The following factors must be considered in balancing a menu:
Flavors
Textures
Appearance
Nutrients
KITCHEN CAPABILITIES AND AVAILABILITY OF FOODS
> Physical conditions place limitations on your menu. Depending on your equipment, your labor force and the foods available to you, certain items will be inconvenient, difficult or even impossible to serve.
Equipment Limitations
> Know the capacities of your equipment and plan menus accordingly. If your broiler capacity is 200 steaks an hour and you plan a banquet menu for 400 people that features broiled shrimp as an appetizer and broiled streaks as a main course, you're in big trouble.
> Spread the workout evenly among your equipment. If you have a ovens, broiler and a fryer balance the roasted and braised items, the broiled items and the fried items.
Personnel Limitations
> Spread the workout evenly among the workers.
Availability of Foods
> Use foods in season. Foods out of season are expensive and often low in quality and their supply is undependable.
MENUS AND COST CONTROL
> Food costs are a major part of the expenses of any food service operation. You can't afford to throw away food any more than you can afford to throw away money. Total utilization of foods must be planned into menus. Whether or not this is done can make or break an operation.
MENU TERMINOLOGY AND ACCURACY
> After you have selected the items you want to include in your menu, you are faced with the problem of what to call them. It is probably better to give too much information than too little. The important thing is to provide enough information so the customer will understand the basic character of the dish and not have any unpleasant surprises.
The menu ia a sales tool, so it is understandable to try to make every dish sound as appealing as possible. Accurate and truthful descriptions however are required:
Point of origin
Grade or Quality
Fresh "If you call something fresh"
Imported
Homemade or Organic
Size or Portion
Here are other examples of common violations:
> Listing "maple syrup" and serving maple-flavored syrup.
> Listing "carbonated beverage by brand name" and serving another brand
> Listing coffee or breakfast cereal with cream and serving milk
> Listing ground round and serving other ground beef