Food Presentation and Plating Standards Checklist

Cross-check against the laminated build card: coupe for crudo, 10-inch matte for entrees, slate for the chef's tasting. Wrong vessel is the most common reason a refire gets called at the pass.

Hot apps and entrees go on plates pulled from the warmer (140°F+); crudo, ceviche, and dessert plates come from the chilled rack. A cold plate kills the sear retention on a 30-second window.

Use the digital scale on the pass — recipe cards list portion in ounces with a +/- 0.25 oz tolerance. Eyeballed portions are the single largest driver of food-cost variance month over month.

Starch base, then protein, then vegetable, then sauce, then garnish — unless the build card says otherwise. Reversing the order traps steam under the protein and softens the sear.

The 10-inch matte plates have an intentional 2-inch rim — components stay inside the inner ring. Crowding the rim is the second most common refire trigger after wrong vessel.

Squeeze bottle for dots, spoon-drag for swooshes, ladle pour for nappe coverage. Sauce never goes over the protein unless the card explicitly calls for it — guests should be able to see the sear.

Garnish comes from the labeled, dated quart on the garde manger reach-in. Anything past 48 hours from prep date gets dumped — wilted chervil on a $42 entree is worse than no garnish at all.

Bar towel plus a damp 90-degree corner for fingerprints. Sauce smears on the rim are the visual cue diners associate with a sloppy kitchen, regardless of how the food itself eats.

Expediter calls the ticket; the firing station repeats back. Capture whether the ticket carries an allergen flag — gluten, dairy, shellfish, tree nut, peanut, soy, egg, sesame are the FDA Big 9.

Allergen tickets plate on the purple-rimmed vessels stored separately on the pass shelf. New gloves, dedicated tongs, dedicated cutting board — no shared fryer oil for gluten-free or peanut-allergen tickets.

Allergen plate goes out on its own trip with the laminated allergen flag in the rim. Runner hand-delivers to the guest, names the allergen out loud, and confirms before setting down.

Photo card lives at the pass for every menu item. Hold the plate next to it for 2 seconds — height, color balance, sauce pattern, garnish placement.

Sous or expediter calls Pass, Refire, or Hold. Refire goes back to the firing station with the reason; Hold parks the plate under the heat lamp while the rest of the table catches up.

Walk the plate back to the firing station, name the issue, and re-fire on the next ticket cycle. Track the refire in the shift log so patterns surface in the weekly line meeting — repeat refires on one dish usually mean the spec card or the line cook needs a reset.

For any item in its first 30 days on the menu, snap a top-down photo before the runner picks up. Chef reviews the gallery weekly to lock in the plating standard before it drifts.