Interpreting the Menu

Creme Caramel

Opening a menu book - or just reading it on a piece of paper - is my most exciting moment during dining-out. If you're feeling the same, then you know why.

The excitement rises from reading all the food names, listed on the menu. The discovery of foods and the imagination of tastes explicit the hunger. So, the simpler the name is, the less exciting it becomes. But this doesn't always mean that a sophisticated name is better.



Nir Dudek writing in 'Reading a Plate' shows that creating a name for a dish is not as simple as it used to be. Instead using a simple word for a name, nowadays chefs seem competing to create a name that can explain the food at the same time. The problem is that they hardly succeeded in delivering the message.

'Beef steak' has developed into 'Marinated London Broil'.

Names such as 'Quiche au Fromage et Choufleur', 'Fragrant Chicken & Almond Curry', 'Dueling Meatloaf', or 'The Salty Turtle Sundae' do not give any instant information to the reader.

Naming it with foreign words only makes it worse. The information gets blurry. At least, it is for me.

Yes, some restaurants usually put additional information underneath the name. It does help. But some chefs/menu designer/menu planner just couldn't help to be complicated. For me, the information is just another puzzle be solved.

Dudek was right. As he puts it, reading the menu is like reading a poetry. It needs interpretation. Sometimes, a lot of it.

And the worst thing about interpretation is that it's not always interpreted in the same way.

That's why my order last week was totally disappointing  After a delicious, crispy, 'Chicken Cordon Bleu' for dinner, I had a 'Creme Caramel' for dessert.

It was okay, I guess. But they don't use caramel syrup for the sauce. Instead, they use mango syrup - with fresh diced mangoes and cherries. Blah.



- Dudek, N. 2008. "Reading a Plate." Gastronomica: The Journal of Food and Culture, Vol. 8, No. 2 (Spring 2008), pp. 51-54.