Many people call foreign food Western food, and some people refer to the food in "Western" developed countries as Western food. In fact, Western food should be accurately regarded as the general term for the dishes of European and American countries in my country, represented by France, Italy, the United States, the United Kingdom, Russia and other countries. In addition to Western food, the foreign food discussed here also includes the food of Singapore, Japan, South Korea and other Asian developed countries. In other words, as a Chinese food messenger, I will talk about the characteristics of the food in developed countries and talk about Western food in a broad sense.

Chef training

In many developed countries, chef training is quite strict. It is necessary to hold a certificate to work. For example, in neighboring Japan, the "Chefs Law" was promulgated around 1954, and the education and assessment standards for chefs are quite strict.

In addition to the cooking technology itself, the curriculum of chef schools in some Western countries includes nutrition, food chemistry, biology, physics, medicine, agriculture, fisheries, forestry, animal husbandry, and food science. , technology, etc., it also offers economics, marketing, psychology, history, folklore, and even materials science, electronics, etc. in newly developed fields to extensively cultivate students' comprehensive qualities. The cooking and catering industry is an industry that changes a lot. Generally, Western cooking schools are equipped with multimedia classrooms, so that students can have a good understanding of new international perspectives, new results, and new methods about cooking. Make culinary education a dynamic training, constantly adapting to social needs o

The good professionalism of Western chefs is also inseparable from the good academic education they received. A long time ago, the kitchen industry was under the top nine in China, and people often discriminated against it. Many people joined the kitchen industry because they had no other choice. Some of the senior chefs are short-sighted and often work to eat, so sometimes they have poor self-control, which affects the entire industry. People used to call chefs "cooks" as a derogatory term. In most chef schools in Western countries, professional ethics is a compulsory course. First of all, it is emphasized that this is a very noble industry, so as to cultivate students' good sense of self-discipline and professionalism.

Many Western countries have fixed the chef assessment standards in the form of laws, and have successively promulgated the "Chef Law" and "Nutritionist Law", raising the entry point for chefs to a very high level. This This is also one of the reasons why the quality of Western food chefs is relatively high.

Kitchen equipment

The kitchens of foreign restaurants are generally spacious and bright, and the ratio of restaurant and kitchen area is generally l:0.6 to 1:lo. Western kitchens often vary according to the food production. According to the process and needs, the kitchen is divided into lettuce processing, raw meat processing, seafood processing, hot vegetable processing, cold vegetable processing, bread processing, snack processing, carving and decoration room, etc. Among them, the large-scale kitchen hot dish processing is divided into seafood production group, cooking and daily special dish group, soup making group, barbecue group, grilled dish making group, vegetable dish making group, egg dish making group, etc. In short, the division of labor in foreign Western kitchens is relatively detailed, each chef has clear responsibilities, and their equipment is also very complete and highly specialized.

Western food equipment mainly refers to various stoves, thermal insulation equipment, cutting equipment, etc. After years of improvement, modern Western food equipment has become economical and practical, has high production efficiency and is easy to operate.

Nowadays, many Western-style food equipment are combined, the degree of automation has been further improved, and they also have temperature control and time control devices inside. Today's Western food cutting machinery tends to be more multi-functional. Some of the equipment are introduced as follows:

Open oven: The fire source is at the top of the oven, which is also called a curium oven. There is a stainless steel rack inside, and the height of the lifting rack can be used to control the heating degree of the dishes. Food cooked in this oven not only matures quickly, but also has easy color control.

Flat stove: Similar to a griddle, the heat source is under the stove surface, and the heat source is a square plate. Food can be fried on the iron plate. This kind of stove has higher work efficiency and good hygienic conditions. For example, if this kind of stove is used to heat casserole dishes in Chinese food, the heating will be more even and the size of the fire is easy to control.

Oven: It is the main equipment in the Western kitchen. It has a wide range of uses. It is mainly divided into two types: pastry oven and dish oven. These are often mixed in Chinese food. According to their working methods, they are divided into conventional type, convection type, Rotary, microwave ovens, etc.

Rice rotary cooking stove: This is a very practical and convenient device. It consists of two parts. The upper part is a square pot and the lower part is a heating furnace. The upper pot can tilt outwards. , more convenient to use.

Bone saw machine: The main purpose is to cut large pieces of meat with bones. It is very convenient to use in large kitchens, and the standard is easy to control and has high efficiency.

Others include more practical universal peeling machines, steamer griddles, multi-functional mixers, slicers, cutting machines, dough openers, heat preservation carts, dough boxes, heat preservation lamps, etc. In addition, in many foreign kitchens, the knives are divided into several types according to different uses, such as chef's knives, slice knives, salad knives, boning knives, serrated knives, machetes, etc. Pots are divided into sauce pots, pans, steamers, etc. according to different uses.

Due to the strong specificity, high automation and humanized design of some foreign kitchen equipment, they have formed the characteristics of convenience and practicality.

And because the division of labor in the kitchen is clear, careful, and professional, the chefs are more proficient, making it easier to ensure the quality of the products and improve work efficiency.

Raw material standards

There is a saying in the Chinese kitchen industry: "The chef's skills are three-quarters, and the ingredients are seven-tenths of the skill." This emphasizes the chef's personal choice of raw materials and the use of them in different grades. Importance, that is, the standard of raw materials plays a decisive role in the production of dishes.

Overseas, suppliers have further standardized and standardized raw materials based on their characteristics. Chefs no longer judge and determine which raw materials to use purely based on their own experience. For example, in the United States, due to the inspection and supervision of food raw materials by the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) and the Ministry of Agriculture, all foods sold on the market before July 1994 were marked with ingredients, fat content, calories, etc. Olive oil is also divided into pure oil, essential oil, first grade, second grade, etc. according to different needs. Here is a brief introduction to some foreign Western food raw materials:

Milk: Milk is an indispensable raw material in Western food. It is divided into whole milk, low-fat milk and skimmed milk according to different needs.

Whole milk refers to milk that has not been skimmed and contains about 3.25% butterfat. It needs to be homogenized, that is, the milk is poured into a high-speed mixer for processing to separate the cream and other substances. Stir until combined.

Low-fat milk is milk that has been partially extracted from the cream. It usually contains about 0.5% to 0.2% butterfat.

Skimmed milk is milk from which all the butterfat has been extracted and contains almost no butterfat.

Others, such as some common raw materials, also have strict grades. American eggs (AA) special grade, first grade (A), second grade (B), third grade (C), etc.

The above are just simple examples. The strict classification standards of cooking raw materials in Western developed countries have reduced cooking errors caused by lack of experience and inaccurate grasp of materials, and also further improved work efficiency. and ensure product quality.

Operating specifications

The stable quality of restaurant dishes comes from standardized operations. In many foreign kitchens, due to the meticulous division of labor, some dishes are similar to assembly line operations. What controls the quality of the products is the standard recipes prepared by each restaurant, that is, the entire process from the selection, purchase, cleaning, cutting, processing, and plating of raw materials has strict requirements and standards, which reduces a lot of human factors. , to ensure unified standards for product quality.

The operational specifications of the dinner ensure the quality of the product, but the chef still needs to reach a certain technical level, and the secret weapon for Western fast food to dominate the world comes from the unified operational specifications. McDonald's food recipes are collected from the headquarters. They can train a student who knows nothing about food production into a qualified skilled worker in a very short time. They rely on various specifications that are thousands of pages thick, so even if the company There is a large turnover of personnel, but the quality of her services and products can still be well guaranteed.

Nowadays, many domestic hotels are also undergoing IS09000 quality management system certification. Some of them are just a formality and cannot play their due role in product control. This requires us to closely follow the standards when formulating operating specifications. Our actual work is more humane and highly operable.

Nutritional Combination

The US FDA stipulates that all foods sold on the market must be labeled with their nutritional content. In terms of food testing, they have relatively advanced testing equipment and can well calculate the actual nutrition of mature food. As far as the author knows, the current nutritional content of recipes tested by domestic evaluation software is actually the accumulation of raw ingredients, and the actual evaluation process of nutritional content after cooking is more complicated and rarely used.

The meat in Western food is mainly chicken, fish, beef, and mutton. At the same time, more attention is paid to the combination of meat and vegetables and nutrition in the side dishes. Western-style dinners generally consist of three or four dishes. The quantity is not too large, but the nutrition is more reasonable. Unlike Chinese food, which is still mainly about gatherings, with eight or nine people sitting around a table, there are at least fifteen or sixteen cold dishes, hot dishes, and staple food. It is not only hygienic The food quality is unreasonable, and the nutritional intake is also unreasonable. Everyone only takes the food they like. Although there are many varieties, the nutrition may not be balanced. What needs to be paid attention to is the combination of color and nutrition. Most Chinese food nowadays is still mainly meat-based food, and it is still troubled by the "three highs".

Most of the raw materials of Western food should be fresh, pollution-free, natural, and the operation process is natural. Try to bring out the original flavor. Don’t use too many dry ingredients.

Olive oil is the main cooking oil used. Many people may not know that olive oil is actually fresh olive juice. Pick an olive in your hand and squeeze it gently, and the juice will flow out. It is different from the sticky feeling we are familiar with, and it is a light oil. I am afraid that in the world of edible oils, it is the freshest. Because it contains a large amount of unsaturated fatty acids and a variety of special ingredients, it has strong antioxidant functions. It is not only easy for the human body to absorb, but also the cooked dishes are not variegated.

At present, the cooking level of abalone and shark fin seems to have become an important indicator of the level of Chinese food chefs.

In our close neighbors Japan and South Korea, they cook fresh abalone in a variety of ways. It can be made into sashimi, stewed in soup, or steamed on top of rice with vegetables, and mixed with onions, garlic, pepper, etc. The taste is extraordinary and the nutrition is reasonable.

Chinese pastries mainly use large oils, which contain large molecules of saturated fatty acids. Excessive consumption is not beneficial to the human body, while Western pastries mainly use butter, which is mainly fat separated from butter and contains Rich in vitamins A, D and inorganic salts, it not only has a fragrant smell but is also beneficial to human body absorption.

Plating for Lai Dian

The plating of Western food is naturally three-dimensional and highly edible. Most of the food on the plate can be eaten, and the decorations are the accompaniments to the main course. vegetable.

The changes in Chinese food craftsmanship are more complicated. Many dishes are labor-intensive and time-consuming, with too many embellishments, and many of the dishes are inedible. This not only results in a waste of raw materials, but the effect may not be good.

Hygiene

Western food has very strict hygiene requirements in terms of system and education. In Shangri-La, you often need to receive training, and there are dedicated hotel health managers to explain, demonstrate, and take exams. The hygienic requirements for eggs are not like when we pick them up and beat them, many dirty things will be beaten out. It needs to be cleaned every day, including the refrigerator and cold storage. Wear gloves and masks when sharing meals.

Professionalism

Foreign companies educate their employees in this way, taking the company's affairs as their own business, the company's interests are higher than personal interests, everything must obey the company's arrangements, and the only way is to work hard. This is the best return for the company.

Work efficiency

When working as a chef abroad, the work is intense and fast, and there is no more time to think. In many cases, they tell you at that time that the results will come soon. In that kind of environment, the chef's work is very tense and orderly. For a banquet of thousands of people, a dozen people can do it in an orderly manner.

Cooking Competition

Foreign cooking competitions have high gold content. Sometimes after a three-day competition for a project, the highest prize may be one or two silver or bronze medals. Either the top one or the other. Gold medal, the judges have very high requirements for the dishes. There are many Western food cooking competitions, more than twenty, unlike Chinese food competitions which only have a few items. This plays a positive role in promoting chefs to improve their skills in many aspects.

Because "Hao Xiang Lai" just stayed with us and offered a 50% discount for the opening, the three of us went to join in the fun. In order to entertain more people, the tables and chairs in the restaurant were very crowded and lacked the elegance and calmness of a Western restaurant. , the tables spread out in a stream, like flowing water mats in the countryside.

In fact, a real Western restaurant pays most attention to the elegance and tranquility of the environment.

Western food is about eating with your mood, while Chinese food is about eating to adjust your mood.

Western food is accompanied by melodious music. You can feel a leisurely mood while eating slowly. Chinese food cannot be lonely, it needs a lively atmosphere, and there must be different words at different meals.

Western food is best when you are in a good mood or when you are in a bad mood. One or two people can sit alone and eat in silence, with your thoughts wandering aimlessly. Chinese food should be eaten with friends. , eating heartily, especially drinking to meet close friends and reunited with relatives.

The meticulousness of Chinese food is unmatched by Western food. Western food pays too much attention to the combination of nutrients and loses its dazzling appearance. Especially the five-ripe food is bloody and shocking, and the varieties are not as good as Chinese food. There are many, Chinese food pays attention to the color, flavor and flavor, and the Chinese food is fried, fried, different heat, different raw materials, and even different techniques can produce different delicacies.

Western food is casual yet solemn, while Chinese food is solemn yet casual. Therefore, on foreign holidays such as Valentine's Day or Christmas Eve, you can sit on a low sofa or rocking chair and listen to the subtle piano music, and you can enjoy a touch at any time. But during the Spring Festival, weddings, or when friends come from far away, it is necessary to sit around the table, exchange cups and glasses, and coordinate the activities. Even if you don't get drunk, you can't express your good mood, let alone express it. Warm and hospitable, it is absolutely impossible for you to feel uneasy at this time.

So Chinese food ≠ Chinese food