arranging rice on dishes

iplogger1

Something occurred to me today.
I was preparing a rice dish and I've just been aimlessly following my wife's preference which is to put the rice to the side of a dish and the main sauce/meat/veg ingredients on the remainder of the dish.
My mother used to serve rice dishes so that the rice followed the circumference of the dish and the non-rice ingredients were arranged
in the centre of the dish.

Is there a "by the book" way of doing this ?
It struck me that often I've ordered dishes in restaurants and they
are named such and such on a "bed of rice" so my instinct is that
the main ingredient should be more integrated into the dish as served
rather than off to the side. Obviously tastes differ.
Which way is "technically" correct ?

~ipl

BuffyBot

The rice-in-a-ring is a very 70's thing which just seems to breed and keep reproducing like wildfire.

I don't think there is a correct way, as such (I tend to just put rice on the side of the plate). You could serve it in a seperate dish, if you really wanted to..

Blub2k4

I wouldn't have said there's a correct way, it's down to presentation really.

Mr. Presentable

Put it upside down in a cup in the plate. Put the rest of the food around and remove the cup! Hey, stick a little flag in it:D

Blub2k4

nipplenuts wrote:

Put it upside down in a cup in the plate. Put the rest of the food around and remove the cup! Hey, stick a little flag in it:D

Yep whatever you do dont forget the flag!!!

The Hill Billy

Skin side down. :rolleyes:

Alun

It depends ... If it's a dish which is just rice plus something else, a stir-fry for example, I'll do the rice in a ring thing, if it's rice plus two or three other things I'll arrange it with the rice in a separate pile.