Mise en place

For the restaurant, see Mise en Place (restaurant).

Mise en place (French pronunciation: [mi zɑ̃ ˈplas]) is a French culinary phrase which means "putting in place" or "gather". It refers to the setup required before cooking, and is often used in professional kitchens to refer to organizing and arranging the ingredients (e.g., cuts of meat, relishes, sauces, par-cooked items, spices, freshly chopped vegetables, and other components) that a cook will require for the menu items that are expected to be prepared during a shift.^[1]

Mise En Place in small bowls for stir fry

Ingredients arranged in a home kitchen for a peanut brittle recipe

Mise en place in a professional kitchen

The practice can be applied in home kitchens.^[2][3]

In the kitchen, the phrase is used as a noun (i.e., the setup of the array of ingredients), a verb (i.e., the process of preparing) and a state of mind.^[4] The term's broader meanings can be applied to classrooms, hospitals, IT departments, and elsewhere.^[4]

Use outside of cooking

The term has also been used outside of cooking: psychologists Weisberg, et al., used the phrase to refer to "how one's stance towards a given environment places constraints on what one feels able to do within that environment, and how these assessments and predispositions impact the process of preparing to act." They used the term in a study of how a school became safer after security measures – like metal detectors and bars on the windows – were removed, leading to the unexpected outcome.^[5]

See also

• Knolling
• Mirepoix
• Glossary of French expressions in English

References

1. Montagné, Prosper. Larousse Gastronomique. Jennifer Harvey Lang (ed.). New York: Crown, 1988. Second English edition.
2. "The Reluctant Gourmet, "Mise en place"". 17 July 2012. Retrieved 10 February 2013.
3. Ruhlman, Michael (14 September 2018). Ruhlman's Twenty. Chronicle Books. p. 13. ISBN 978-0811876438. Retrieved 27 January 2015. There's no reason it won't work for you in your kitchen at home.
4. Charnas, Dan (2016). Work Clean: The life-changing power of mise-en-place to organize your life, work, and mind. Rodale. ISBN 9781623365936.
5. Weisberg, Deena Skolnick; et al. (June 2014). "Mise en place: setting the stage for thought and action" (PDF). Trends in Cognitive Sciences. 18 (6): 276–278. doi:10.1016/j.tics.2014.02.012. PMID 24684854. S2CID 35633523. Retrieved May 31, 2016.

External links

• À la carte webpage discussing mise en place
• NPR Morning Edition story about mise en place