Mise en place your vocabulary with these culinary gems.
A delicate Japanese stock made primarily from kombu (seaweed) and bonito flakes, serving as the foundational broth for countless Japanese dishes. It's Japanese cooking's equivalent to French stock, but takes 20 minutes instead of 8 hours.
To cut food into small, uniform cubes. The most satisfying knife work for beginners and the baseline expectation before you can advance to fancier cuts.
A fine powder sprinkled over a dish for color, flavor, or visual drama—made from dried herbs, spices, freeze-dried fruit, or other ingredients. It's the garnish for when you want to be mysterious.
A hasty evasive maneuver, or the aquatic bird that inspired said maneuver. In kitchens, it's that gloriously fatty waterfowl that makes roasts sing and chefs weep with joy.
A gritty saxophone technique where the player hums intensely into the instrument to create a grinding, growling sound—commonly used in blues, jazz, and rock to add raw attitude and edge.
To prepare (food) for consumption by cleaning, trimming, and seasoning. Also means looking sharp enough that your customers don't question your hygiene standards.
Angled slices made at approximately 45 degrees to create elliptical pieces that increase surface area. It's the vegetable equivalent of cutting on the bias.