I always do mise en place. I find it so efficient!

But my boyfriend does the dishes, so I always get: ''Hun, why do you dirty so many bowls !?"

Haha, i get the same thing as Marie-Eve. I always trade cooking for dishes but get a LOT of flack if I produce too many.

I usually do it like Emma mentioned and combine things that will be added at the same time together. Often I will also use whatever the final dish will be served on/in as well to cut down on dishes even more, assuming its not raw meat, eggs etc you can usually just rinse off and dry before serving. Or simply use our large cutting board and keep everything in neat little piles to scoop off.

It does help a lot.

I like doing a mise en place for anything with more than a couple of of steps. Sometimes I make the little ingredient piles on one larger plate (or a couple) to cut down on the amount of ramekins to wash at the end.
It looks cute, too.

Yup - I'm the same as adamwa et al. If it goes in at the same time, it goes into the same prep bowl or ramekin.

However... I just realized that I should switch the ramekins for a bunch of little glass bowls that will stack better. My ramekins just don't stack well in the cupboard.

I get all of the ingredients out that I plan to use (there is nothing quite as annoying as needing to run out for an ingredient you could have sworn you had but didn't, actually) and if there is a lot of chopping to be done, do that and leave little piles on the cutting board. Other than that, I don't do much prep unless it's a really fast paced recipe and I won't have time in between steps.

Now, if it's something complicated that I haven't done before, that's another story. For those, I do tend to do mise en place (how do you pronounce that, anyway?).

I only tend to use it for time sensitive things like stir fries when food cooks quickly and has to be added in a certain order. Its good for me for baking too, because I'm constantly forgetting things so it helps me remember everything!

For time saving I will group things in bowls by when they are cooked. If onions and peppers are cooked together, they go in a bowl together, etc.

I always try to do this at home, but my boyfriend calls me fussy. Maybe now that I know the fancy name for it, he'll lay off!

http://www.awapplesauce.etsy.com

@Tiamat, it's meez-aw(n)-PLAHSS. It's hard to exactly describe the sound for "en," except to say that the n is not totally silent, but not quite pronounced, either.

I recently blogged about how helpful this is when you have children helping you out in the kitchen.

http://good-life-eats.blogspot.com/2009/03/orange-chocolate-chunk-brownies.html

I always like starting with a clean kitchen and being organized as I go.

Julie, thanks! I know how the "en" is supposed to sound, it's the rest of it that I find baffling. Spanish might have helped me as a Californian, but French would have been better for me as a cook!

I like to, but I try to achieve a balance between being totally prepped and not using too many dishes - 'cause I have to wash my own! It is especially helpful when doing more complicated recipes with lots of steps and ingredients. For some quick and easy day-to-day recipes, I don't bother!

I generally do, especially if it is a special or new recipe... for more everyday meals, speed is usually a priority, and so I get things started and work in stages, taking advantage of cooking times. I'm quite sure of my ingredients when I do though.

My mom taught me mise en place when she went to culinary school. I use it all the time, but have learned to modify it, b/c sometimes a dish takes longer when I prep everything first. Like for a stew, prep & begin browning the meat & onions, then prep the rest of the veggies while the onions are cooking. It saves time. I gather all the spices, but measure them directly into the pot. Good hints that folks mentioned - keep ingredients separate in 1 plate and use the serving dish or your dinner plate - cut down on the dirty dishes.

I'm much better about doing mise en place than I was even just 2-years ago.

To try to reduce the dirty dishes, I combine the ingredients in the order they are cooked/used. And since I don't seek out complicated recipes there may only be 2-3 major steps.

I'd like to measure spices straight into the pot but it seems like I always forget one!

I will usually gather things up, if I can - but I won't always prep them before starting. I'm kind of a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants cook. I almost never work from a recipe, cooking mostly by taste, so I'm often dashing to the fridge to grab something that an individual dish needs.

Plus, I find it often saves me time, to multi-task. Chop onions while pan heats, mince garlic while onions saute, mince herbs while dish simmers, etc...

Del
www.delementals.com

Boyfriend & I have worked out a system - I do the recipe choosing (approval by him, of course) and all of the prep work. My dad always used little prep bowls to cook, so I picked that up from him - plus, it makes it way easier for the boyfriend to cook - everything is laid out for him already.

But totally agree... he does complain about the amount of dishes. Oh well! :)

-Ruth

I did this yesterday and hosted a very successful birthday as a result. I gathered like ingredients from the various recipes together and prepared them simultaneously (chopping all the aromatics one after the other, then vegetables, then meats), which cut down on rewashing knives and cutting boards, etc.

Everything was prepped on the counter and those recipes that needed to be finished just before eating came together effortlessly. My guests sat at the counter and watched me work, they said it was like watching a chef on the food network (a huge compliment for me considering it was coming from my cooking mentors, my mother and my mother-in-law!). I had a great time and they weren't bored watching me peel 5 lbs of potatoes!

always!

Yup. Makes things so much more efficient. I too include more than 1 ingredient in a bowl if it goes in at the same time.

I know I should do this, but I just hate to! I'm always afraid that it will end up taking more time, since I generally chop onions while heating the skillet, then chop the rest of the veggies while the onions are cooking, etc.

I do, however, often write out a schedule for complicated meals, broken up in five-minute increments, so I don't have to keep consulting various cookbooks and recipes for what to do next. I usually do that several days before. Once I'm in the kitchen, I just get impatient to start cooking. One day, I'm going to be better about mise en place.

I often gather the ingredients on the counter or at least make sure I have them all, but I tend to do the prepwork of later steps while I'm waiting for the earlier steps. Chop veggies while I wait for water to boil and that sort of thing. I usually make some sort of plan in my head for what order I can do things in as I'm reading the recipe, and if I see that a lot of prepped things need to be added at once early on, then I will chop them first thing.

I pretty much just do it in a common sense sort of way. Sometimes it works better than others. Sometimes I find myself rushing to get the next ingredient ready before the first one burns, or more likely pulling a pan off the burner to prevent this.

My knife skills SUCK, so I always try to get everything chopped in advanced, except for things like garlic that should be minced right before use.

I've just started trying to cook stir-fries at home and now really understand the need for mise en place! Such different prep is necessary compared to that needed to cook long, slow casseroles and stews. :-)

I'm attempting another stir-fry tonight and am going to make sure that I have every last ingredient prepared before heating up the wok. I'll be making good use of my ramekins!

Thanks for the timely advice.

I'm with Tiamat - I make little piles on the cutting board or counter, but I'm not washing all those little bowls :) We have a family of 6, and every unnecessary dish adds up! I also agree with SnorkelVik - sometimes it's a better use of my time to just prep the initial steps, because those steps have some "lag time" to cook, steam, etc. I can grate cheese while milk heats, for example. If I grate all the cheese beforehand, I'm just standing there stirring milk. I'm not in a sip-a-glass-of-wine-and-make-a-leisurely-dinner stage of life :) It's all about efficiency right now, and planning my steps to include using any and all standing around time is key for me.

i make a mess in the kitchen but unless i'm using a lot of liquids i make piles on the (admittedly gigantic) cutting board.

plus i do the dishes :)

well...:( i don't like doing dishes.

I got a large set of these little bowls and dishes from my fiance's grandmother's old restaurant and they make my cooking so much easier! I love setting them all out and getting everything all ready to go ahead of time; it looks pretty with all the different colors and makes the process that much faster. I just wish I had more than a foot of available counter space in our cramped apartment kitchen. :/

Mise en place can eat away at a lot of precious counter space. I therefore only do the initial mise en place for the first part of the recipe, right up until I have to monitor something without being active. For example, I do the mise en place for the rest of the recipe while the pasta is cooking. When I make risotto, I only prep the veggies and meat that need to be cooked and set aside before cooking the actual risotto. While the veggies and meat are cooking, I prep the rice, onions, broth and wine.

About the excess dishes, I don't see a problem with this as most bowls/plates can be simply rinsed and reused/shelved as I go. Only the sticky dishes remain by the time I am done cooking.

I also put ingredients that are used at the same time in one big bowl rather than each its own. For liquid ingredients, I usually just put the containers on the counter and measure when they are needed, reusing the same measuring cup that I rinse as I go. I put away containers as soon as I am done with them, so there is never too much stuff on the counter to mess up. An exception is when I need to mix several liquid ingredients before using them, in which case I use a bowl instead of leaving out several containers.

I find that mise en place is very useful and sometimes indispensable for all the reasons above, but it also makes cooking a fun, sensual experience. It is pure joy to see all those colours and textures all lined up and this makes cooking that much more pleasant.

Partyshark, I can totally relate to what you say about poor knife skills and the need to clean, slice and chop everything in advance. I also cry a lot because of chopped onions just sitting there for innumerable minutes, which is why I got into the habit of chopping them before anything else, throwing them in a bowl and putting a saucer on the bowl.

But I am afraid you might be mistaken about garlic. Did you know the only way to really get the artery-declogging benefit of garlic is to let it oxydate for about fifteen minutes after grating/chopping before using it? Yes, it does brown a bit in the process, but you never would use a large enough amount to see any difference in the finished product.

Here is my attempt at teaching the pronunciation.

Meez ong plus.

Just don't totally pronounce the G.