How do courses at dinner work where you live?

November 22, 2013 5:39 AM

I am in the UK and am fascinated by a 'salad course' separate to either a starter or main course. I would like to know how that works, and how a typical multi-course meal would go where you live.

To start off I'll say that the fanciest meal I've eaten in the UK had:
Starter (goat's cheese tart)
Intermezzo (sorbet)
Main (chicken, potatoes and vegetables)
Pudding (creme brûlée)
Cheese (cheese board per table)
More normally, I would expect starter - main - pudding. And I know that you could theoretically have a fish course between the starter and main. How does dinner work where you are (and mention where that is)?

posted by plonkee to Food & Drink (27 answers total)

I'm in the Southern US and your general "starter - main - pudding" generally applies here (although we would say "appetizer - entree - dessert"), but sometimes a salad is the appetizer. If not, usually we would order an appetizer to share, then salad - entree - dessert. But tacking on an extra salad course is generally too much food for most normal restaurant meals, especially with our famously large portion sizes over here.
posted by something something at 5:41 AM on November 22, 2013 [2 favorites]

We're in the NE US, but we follow a more Continental approach to dining at home, and the salad course comes after the entree.
posted by Admiral Haddock at 5:50 AM on November 22, 2013 [1 favorite]

I'm in the US and pretty much everywhere you dine will offer a salad before the entree. If you order an appetizer (starter) it will arrive first. In most restaurants this is shared by all the diners at the table. Then salads arrive. Then the entree. If people are up to it, dessert, it's not unusual to order just one for the table. There was a fad that's just now dying out now where you had the option of a mini dessert, basically a couple of bites of something, served in a shot glass. Fie on that!
posted by Ruthless Bunny at 5:54 AM on November 22, 2013 [6 favorites]

Salads are kind of odd ducks. Some places automatically give them before the meal (US New England here) and some offer you salads either before or with the meal. There are "side salads," which can be either before the meal or with the meal, as well. Very rarely does a restaurant where I've been offer a salad after the meal, though some family occasions I've been to they do.
posted by xingcat at 6:04 AM on November 22, 2013 [1 favorite]

I've lived in various parts of the US. At home, it's pretty common to just eat salad with the rest of the meal.

At non-upscale restaurants, the typical course order goes appetizer, soup or salad, entree, dessert. Usually they're all priced separately, though some entrees have a soup or salad included in the price. But it's pretty common to buy just the entree.

From my somewhat limited experience with finer restaurants with a multi-course prix fixe menu, salads are not always included. Sometimes there will be a fancy salad (or the option of one) for the first or second course.
posted by Metroid Baby at 6:04 AM on November 22, 2013 [1 favorite]

US catered events, in my experience, are open with a stand-up cocktail time where cheese and fruit and othe nibbles easily managed by people walking around in high heels. Dinner is seated with salad, soup if there is one, main course, and then coffee and dessert and possibly after-dinner drinks.

Lunch events are typically, unfortunately, the same model but without pre-dinner drinks.

Have also been to a number of swanky galas, typically arts, with a buffet and people from the host organization scuttling around urging people to "eat at any time" or to *please feel free to start when everyone from your table is ready." Presumably, they want to avoid buffet lines. Buffet, in my US experience, always includes wine waiters ever ready with a fresh glass.

When I have dinners, the whole meal is ready at the same time because I'm lazy. Or, I do a cookout and serve as people are ready.
posted by Lesser Shrew at 6:04 AM on November 22, 2013 [2 favorites]

In France... (a) hors d'oeuvre: for example: marinated mushrooms; crudities... marinated raw vegetables; panache... tomato and cucumber; herring; soup; (b) main course (c) green salad (d) cheese (e) coffee
posted by Mister Bijou at 6:11 AM on November 22, 2013 [1 favorite]

Here (northern Midwest of the US), a simple 3 course restaurant meal usually starts with a choice or soup or salad, served first, then the main dish, then dessert. If you order an appetizer it will come first, before the soup/salad. Appetizers are intended to be shared, and first course is usually a small cup of soup, or a small simple salad, not a huge filling dish with lots of veggies and other additions, just mostly lettuce, with maybe a few slices of tomato and cucumber, and a choice of dressings.
posted by catatethebird at 6:48 AM on November 22, 2013

How does dinner work where you are (and mention where that is)?

Growing up in Russia, it was always:

Hors d'oeuvres
Soup
Salad
Main Course
Coffee/Tea and dessert

Of course the formality mattered a lot. A joke I heard from a family friend was that when guests come over, you empty the refrigerator onto the table even if there's a single pickle in it.

If you were serving guests, they arrived to a table spread out with tons and tons of hors d'oeuvres; enough for a full meal if you wanted. These never leave the table unless room needs to be made. If it is just a family dinner, the hors d'oeuvres "course" could just be some buttered bread to hold you over until soup.

Soup is its own thing. It comes, you eat it, it goes. You do not linger with soup.

Salad comes next and sometimes you can serve it with the main course in less formal occasions. The more Americanized my family got, the more that happened.

Plates are generally cleared for the main course and it is served hot and fresh. Almost always there's a a big thing of the meal and everyone is ladled/served some. Plates are prepared at the table, not beforehand. Sometimes there's more than one round if more than one food was prepared. So the potatoes and chicken go around, then the lamb, then the beef, etc.

After that, everything is cleared again and everyone coffee and desert.
posted by griphus at 7:03 AM on November 22, 2013 [4 favorites]

Fascinating! I love learning about food differences across cultures. Having the salad after the main has literally never occurred to me. I'm in the US. My personal fave is the "dinner salad" which is a meal unto itself. I am an ectomorph and a big-ass green salad topped with sliced chicken breast, cheese, ranch, nuts, beans is my preferred method of gluttony.

I hate restaurants with "automatic salad" because it's usually some sad iceberg with two tomatoes on top. Waste of time, cheap filler to make the customer feel like they are getting a lot for their money.
posted by polly_dactyl at 7:03 AM on November 22, 2013

Reading what Mister Bijou says above, I can guarantee that the Russian thing I describe is a direct descendant of the French way of serving. Although, like everything cultural in Russia that isn't Slavic by nature, it's French but a bit off.
posted by griphus at 7:11 AM on November 22, 2013

When I throw a fancy dinner party (eastern USA), I will often do a salad course (and possibly a soup course as well) between a hot appetizer and the main course. The strategic advantage of this is that it doesn't require stove space, so I can have the main course cooking while I prep and serve the salad. I tend to eat and serve large salads (I prefer raw vegetables and try to eat lots of them and less meat than average) to the point they can't really coexist on a plate with the main course and having them served separately seems easier than trying to juggle having two plates on the table at the same time for diners.
posted by Candleman at 7:15 AM on November 22, 2013 [1 favorite]

Candleman... given your strategy... aren't your guests already beginning to feel full prior to the time they finally get to tackle the main course?
posted by Mister Bijou at 7:20 AM on November 22, 2013

In Hong Kong... the first dish to arrive is the first one that comes out of the wok. After that, a stream of dishes arrive. Steamed dishes generally take longer. What about the white rice? Generally only asked for around the middle of meal. Why? In a social setting, white rice is often considered a poor man's filler. To order early would be taken as a sign by the guests the host has not provided enough in the way of 'dishes'.
posted by Mister Bijou at 7:29 AM on November 22, 2013

griphus hits on an interesting fact I recently read: Service à la française is essentially serving all dishes at the same time while service à la russe is the sequential service most are describing above.
posted by JackBurden at 7:34 AM on November 22, 2013 [1 favorite]

In a social setting, white rice is often considered a poor man's filler. To order early would be taken as a sign by the guests the host has not provided enough in the way of 'dishes'.

Interesting. So are you saying that everyone *wants* the white rice always - because it's good, not because they're hungry - but they still wait?
posted by scose at 7:47 AM on November 22, 2013

A salad course after the main is something I (American) think of as vaguely European (French/Italian?) whether or not that's accurate. Salad almost always comes first here although across my fine dining experiences with small plates or prix fixe, it's not too unusual to have some kind of lighter course toward the end but before dessert as a refresher. But most restaurant meals I've had follow the standard light to heavy progression. I've also been offered random one-bite gifts from the chef at various points in the meal at high end places; if it's the very first thing it's an "amuse bouche", I've also had the sorbet intermezzo you mention after a main.
posted by slow graffiti at 7:57 AM on November 22, 2013

Erhh... as I understand it... white rice is fundamental to life south of the Yangtze River. For a region riven by centuries of warlordism, civil wars, natural and unnatural famines, white rice was often the only food the poor had. If that. And the historic memory is strong. In very prosperous Hong Kong, even today, the equivalent of "How are you?" is "Have you eaten your rice yet?".

In a Hong Kong social setting, yes, of course, people look forward to white rice as an accompaniment. And some varieties of white rice are more favoured than others. Thai rice is very popular. But in a social setting... to be able to fill up on 'more main dishes the better' first, before falling back on the 'poor man's filler' is generally the norm. Well, that's my observation.
posted by Mister Bijou at 8:24 AM on November 22, 2013

aren't your guests already beginning to feel full prior to the time they finally get to tackle the main course

That's partially by design. My guests know that I go with the "Eat food, not too much, mostly plants" theory at my events but being fullish helps keep down disappointment that they're not getting a 12oz steak. It's more like a six or seven course tasting menu where there's a lot of small dishes than a big main course thing.
posted by Candleman at 8:24 AM on November 22, 2013

The salad before main thing I've only experienced in "Western" restaurants in Taiwan. I assumed it came from the US, possibly via Japan.
posted by kerplunk at 8:26 AM on November 22, 2013

I think this is complicated by a lot of factors, especially formality and class.

I grew up middle class in the southern US, from a more rural/lower-class background. In our house, my parents just served the one main course. We would sometimes have a side salad if the main course was especially light on vegetables. This salad was typically an alternative to a cooked vegetable side.

More formal meals among my family and friends growing up were served buffet style and much more likely to be composed of a main and several sides served at the same time rather than multiple courses.

The whole "salad course" thing, to me, has always seemed incredibly posh. I don't know anyone who eats that way. The only context in which I'm familiar with multiple courses is in fine dining.
posted by Sara C. at 11:19 AM on November 22, 2013

Here, in Denmark, its an appetizer or several (some of which may be a salad or soup, or a fish of some sort), then a main course of fish or meat with sides of vegetables and finally cheese/desert. Normally, a salad of raw vegetables is put on the table with the main course. When I was younger, most people used to eat the salad after the main course, even though it was always on the table from the outset of the main course. Sometimes there were separate plates for the salad. Now people seem to take it on the plate alongside the meat or fish right away. Maybe because sauces and gravies aren't as important anymore.
In my extended family, there is often no real appetizer, more something like snacks before dinner, eaten in the kitchen or garden. I don't know how normal that is.
NOMA is influencing restaurant dining a lot, so many places you get a fixed menu with 5-12 small dishes rather than some courses being more important than others. But in homes or at private parties, I've never seen anything like that.
Now very curious, I've looked in some elder and newer cookbooks, including some with hand-written notes from grandmothers and great-grandmothers, and it seems that up till the 1950's, a normal starter was almost always soup or porridge, then meat or fish with potatoes, boiled vegetables and a simple salad of lettuce or cucumbers, then a fruit dessert, a milk pudding or a fresh fruit. Meat was expensive, so the whole set-up is about getting full from cheaper foodstuffs.
Back then, a fine dinner at a restaurant or for a wedding seems to have been with a soup, two or several main courses (alternating fish and meat), a salad, maybe cheese and then dessert. There might have been French inspired gratins, patés or crustades among the several mains.
posted by mumimor at 1:12 PM on November 22, 2013

In a "fancy" restaurant in the US, the service seems to usually go:
1. amuse bouche
2. appetizer (hot or cold -- might be salad)
3. main dish
4. dessert or cheese and coffee

In a "regular" restaurant in the US, the service usually seems to be:
1. hot appetizer
2. soup or salad
3. main dish
4. dessert and coffee

At home in the US, it's often just:
1. main dish (with salad, if that's served)
2. dessert

My family is French, and in my experience, a meal served the French way is:
1. aperitif and nibbles (nuts, potato chips, something little)
2. hot appetizer (cooked just before serving)
3. main dish (cooked just before serving)
4. salad
5. cheese
6. dessert and coffee
7. hard liquor

Casual meals at home follow the same general formula, but the courses might be very small or very close together (though still separated), and courses obviously get skipped if you don't have that kind of food on hand or don't feel like eating it. Also, the cheese and dessert might be served together.

In terms of service, the main difference between eating at home and eating in a restaurant is that in a restaurant you may also get an amuse bouche before the hot appetizer.

Reading what Mister Bijou says above, I can guarantee that the Russian thing I describe is a direct descendant of the French way of serving. Although, like everything cultural in Russia that isn't Slavic by nature, it's French but a bit off.

griphus hits on an interesting fact I recently read: Service à la française is essentially serving all dishes at the same time while service à la russe is the sequential service most are describing above.

griphus, serving courses actually came to France by way of Russia, not the other way around, so it's the French who are a little off! But oddly, in my experience people don't eat that way at home or even in restaurants in Russia the way they do in France -- is that true generally? And in my experience, for a big celebration meal, the Russian MO is to basically fill the table with food and bring out new dishes/clear dishes to keep the table full, but I always thought it was a logistical maneuver -- is it usually more formal? I've been to a lot of those kinds of dinners, but my Russian is terrible and I'm usually so busy trying not to get drunk that I can't really tell what's going on.
posted by rue72 at 2:44 PM on November 22, 2013

Russian MO is to basically fill the table with food and bring out new dishes/clear dishes to keep the table full...

Sort of! There's a difference between the sorts of food that are already on the table when you arrive and the food that is served as the meal goes on. It's not as simple as "the food served after people sit down is hot" but that's probably the best way to think about it. The Big Table Dinner thing makes a clear distinction between food that you arrive to (but never leaves/is refilled) and the food presented as courses. So it's sort of a hybrid between russe and francaise.

But at home, and at the homes of my Russian friends, meals were always regimented and usually in the same fashion: a small sandwich or something, then soup, then salad, then the main course. Sometimes the salad was served with the soup, or sometimes it was served with the main course, but "mom getting cross with you because you're eating too slow and the next course is getting cold" was a thing we were all familiar with.
posted by griphus at 2:52 PM on November 22, 2013 [1 favorite]

Also bear in mind that as the generations of Russian emigres in America roll on, that culture is every day growing more and more distinct from contemporary Russian-in-Russia culture. I've often heard Brighton -- the part of Brookyln that has these sort of big-table restaurants and that sort of serving culture-- referred to as a time capsule of the 1970s.
posted by griphus at 3:01 PM on November 22, 2013

Fanciest meals I've had in California:

appetizer
soup
fish/seafood
palate cleanser/salad
main course
dessert

If I'm making a fancy dinner, I do:

appetizer
soup
salad
main course
dessert

... though we very often will have an entire salad for dinner when we are not being remotely fancy.

Salad comes first if you are not having soup, in the generally California-American style of eating. Though I have had salad after the main course in French meals, and according to my ancient Joy of Cooking that used to be how things were done in the U.S.
posted by oneirodynia at 5:44 PM on November 22, 2013 [1 favorite]

Australia is just like the UK, if you didn't know. Salads come with the main meal, never separately.
posted by wilful at 1:28 AM on November 23, 2013