In
dining, a course is a specific set of
food
Food is any substance consumed by an organism for nutritional support. Food is usually of plant, animal, or fungal origin, and contains essential nutrients, such as carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, or minerals. The substance is in ...
items that are served together during a
meal
A meal is an eating occasion that takes place at a certain time and includes consumption of food. The names used for specific meals in English vary, depending on the speaker's culture, the time of day, or the size of the meal.
Although they c ...
, all at the same time. A course may include multiple
dishes or only one, and often includes items with some variety of
flavors. For instance, a
hamburger
A hamburger, or simply burger, is a food consisting of fillings—usually a patty of ground meat, typically beef—placed inside a sliced bun or bread roll. Hamburgers are often served with cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, pickles, bacon, ...
served with
French fries
French fries (North American English), chips (British English), finger chips (Indian English), french-fried potatoes, or simply fries, are '' batonnet'' or ''allumette''-cut deep-fried potatoes of disputed origin from Belgium and France. Th ...
would be considered a single course, and most likely the entire meal. Likewise, an extended
banquet
A banquet (; ) is a formal large meal where a number of people consume food together. Banquets are traditionally held to enhance the prestige of a host, or reinforce social bonds among joint contributors. Modern examples of these purposes i ...
might include
many courses, such as a course where a
soup
Soup is a primarily liquid food, generally served warm or hot (but may be cool or cold), that is made by combining ingredients of meat or vegetables with stock, milk, or water. Hot soups are additionally characterized by boiling soli ...
is served by itself, a course where
cordon bleu is served at the same time as its
garnish and perhaps a
side dish, and later a
dessert
Dessert is a course that concludes a meal. The course consists of sweet foods, such as confections, and possibly a beverage such as dessert wine and liqueur. In some parts of the world, such as much of Greece and West Africa, and most parts o ...
such as a
pumpkin pie. Courses may vary in size as well as number depending on the culture where the meal takes place.
Meals are composed of one or more courses,
which in turn are composed of one or more dishes.
When dishes are served mostly in a single course, this is called
service à la française
(; "service in the French style") is the practice of serving various dishes of meal at the same time, with the diners helping themselves from the serving dishes. That contrasts to (; "service in the Russian style") in which dishes are brought ...
; when dishes are served mostly in separate courses, this is called
service à la russe.
Etymology
The word is derived from the French word ''cours'' (run), and came into English in the 14th century.
It came to be used perhaps because the food in a banquet serving had to be brought at speed from a remote kitchen – in the 1420 cookbook ''
Du fait de cuisine'' the word "course" is used interchangeably with the word for serving.
See also
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Cookbook
A cookbook or cookery book is a kitchen reference containing recipes.
Cookbooks may be general, or may specialize in a particular cuisine or category of food.
Recipes in cookbooks are organized in various ways: by course (appetizer, first cour ...
*
Culinary arts
Culinary arts are the cuisine arts of food preparation, cooking and presentation of food, usually in the form of meals. People working in this field – especially in establishments such as restaurants – are commonly called chefs ...
*
Full course dinner
*
hRecipe
hRecipe is a draft microformat for publishing details of recipes using (X)HTML on web pages, using HTML classes and ''rel'' attributes. In its simplest form, it can be used to identify individual foodstuffs, because the only required propertie ...
– a
microformat for marking-up recipes in web pages
*
Italian meal structure
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List of desserts
A dessert is typically the sweet course that, after the entrée and main course, concludes a meal in the culture of many countries, particularly Western culture. The course usually consists of sweet foods, but may include other items. The word ...
*
Lists of foods
*
Main course
A main course is the featured or primary dish in a meal consisting of several courses. It usually follows the entrée ("entry") course.
Typically, the main course is the meal that is the heaviest, heartiest, and most intricate or substantial ...
*
Recipe
A recipe is a set of instructions that describes how to prepare or make something, especially a dish of prepared food. A sub-recipe or subrecipe is a recipe for an ingredient that will be called for in the instructions for the main recipe.
His ...
*
Sadhya
References
Food and drink terminology
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