What Is Mise en Place? A Complete Guide for Beginner Chefs

Mise en place is a term that you will hear a lot of cooks and chefs talking about. But what does it really mean and why is it so important?

In French, Mise en Place means to have “everything in its place”. In the kitchen, this refers to preparing your ingredients and setting up your work area ready for cooking or the service period. In a busy kitchen, everything must be prepared and ready for a fast service to customers, you don’t peel and cut vegetables during service, you can’t make a stew during service and you cannot bake a cake during service. 

As much work as possible is performed during the preparation period and then dishes are put together or finished of during the service period. This is preparing your mise en place, to have everything ready and in its place for the service period. 

Mise en place list 

When you start your career in the kitchen, you will start every day and every shift by creating or being given a ‘Mise en Place List’. This is a small written list on just a plain piece of paper with all the tasks that you must perform and have ready for the service period that lies ahead. This will include tasks such as 

·         Cut all the ingredients that you will use during service to finish dishes and sauce, such as chopped parsley, finely diced onion, sliced mushrooms, toasted almonds and small bowls of all sorts of ingredients

•          Wash lettuce and greens
•          Wash, peel and cut vegetables
•         Blanch vegetables in boiling water to par cook then so they are quick to heat during service
•         Trim and portion cuts of meat
•          Trim and portion cuts of fish and seafood
•       Prepare dressings and sauces 
•          Cook dishes that require long and slow cooking times, such as stewed and braised dishes.
•         Bake and prepare desserts and cakes

Starting out 

When you start your first job in a real kitchen, preparing mise en place will be your main role and your opportunity to show that you are focused, can follow directions, are organised and can get the job done in a reasonable amount of time. If you perform well in preparing the mise en place, then gradually you will be given opportunities to get more involved in the cooking side of the kitchen. So don’t think that you are being given unimportant jobs, mise en place is the backbone of every commercial kitchen and one of the main roles of every professional chef at every level. These are the skills and habits that you will build your career on. 

Tips 

1.      Exact - Follow the instructions you have been given exactly, don’t change anything or do things in a different way. In the kitchen, fine detail is important. If you have been given a recipe, then follow that recipe exactly.

2.      Size matters – when you are cutting ingredients like vegetables, onions or meat portions, size really does matter. Cut to the exact size and weight you have been shown, near enough is not good enough; it must be the exact size.

3.      Quick – Be quick but not clumsy, there is a lot of work to be done and a lot of food to prepare, so speed is an important skill.  

4.      Ask- If you are not sure about what you should be doing, ask, don’t be shy about it, there is nothing wrong with asking and it is much better than wasting ingredients by preparing them incorrectly.

5.      Knife skills – As you develop and gain more experience, your knife skills will also develop. Use your knives in the way that you have been taught so that professional skills develop over time.

6.      List – Cross off each item on the list as you have completed that task.

7.      Clean – Clean as you go, don’t create a mess, that is sloppy, makes you look bad and slows you down.

8.      Late – If you are running behind schedule, keep your supervisor informed, especially if service time is approaching fast.

9.      Food safety – Don’t forget all your food safety rules. 

If you are serious about becoming a chef, learning professional kitchen skills is essential. Culinary Solutions Academy offers 40 online culinary courses for around $8 USD per course that are designed to help you. Take a look at the subject CSATC007 Basic Principles of Mise en Place