# what does DECONSTRUCTED mean?



## amazingrace

Okay, maybe I was absent the day it arrived, but I keep hearing this buzz-word "deconstructed" in food descriptions, especially on the cooking shows. I would take it mean that the individual components would be arranged separately, rather than combined? However, when I look at the food, I don't see that. If it's a sauce, for instance, it still looks like _sauce, _salad looks like _salad_, etc_. _Can someone help this make sense to me?


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## suzanne

Here's a description I wrote some time ago for another food chat site:
If you're not even more confused now :lol:, deconstructed dishes may take the foods that are normally combined in the dish, change their forms, and then plate them together in a different way. It's not just about taking the dish apart, but putting its elements back together.


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## boar_d_laze

This is so much like what I was going to say that there's no reason left so say it.

Pouting,
BDL


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## amazingrace

Thanks for the replies. 

When I posted the original question, I was feeling rather inadequate for not knowing what this term was supposed to mean. Now, I've decided it's merely pretentious "chef-speak", invented to elevate the dish to a (higher level?) than it actually needs or even ought to have. Since oyster chowder was used as an example, I'll continue with that. I enjoy traditional chowders, prepared in the traditional way, with the ingredients combined so that they play off one another in subtle harmony. I don't especially want to taste the individual components, so much as I want to enjoy the result of their successful infusion.

If this ignites a firestorm of protests, so be it. It's still my opinion. :look:


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## oregonyeti

Deconstructed means demolished or blown up (out of proportion?).


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## kyheirloomer

>DECONSTRUCTED OYSTER CHOWDER......<

Suzanne, this is absolutely, sublimely perfect!

Do you mind if I share it with the members of anouther group?


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## koukouvagia

Yes it can be pretentious but it's not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes deconstructing a dish can make it easier to prepare. The oyster example I believe is the height of pretention and quite a bad example. Let me give you an example of something I deconstruct that's not so pretentious.

Apple Pie Deconstructed

Filling
-5-6 golden delicious apples cut into 1/2 inch cubes
-1 cinammon stick
-freshly grated nutmeg
-2 tbsp brown sugar
-1/4 cup bailey's irish cream
-1/2 stick butter

Crust
-frozen puff pastry defrostred
-powdered sugar
-powdered cinnamon

1. Preheat the oven to 400
2. With a rolling pin roll out the puff pastry
3. sprinkle with cinamon and sugar, fold over, and roll again. Repeat this process at least one more time. Cut into single serving triangles or squares.
4. Stick in the oven until puffed.
5. On the stove top combine the filling ingredients and simmer for 1/2 hour or until as gooey as you like.

Plate:
Place one puff on a plate. Top with apple goo. Then top with custard (homemade and warm I hope).

Why do I deconstruct my apple pie? So I can make as much as I like, where as 1 whole apple pie might be too much. So i can top my puff with as much as little apple filling as I like.

I'm willing to bet that you deconstruct a lot of food that you make without even realizing it.


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## amazingrace

Maybe. However, I cannot think of anything offhand. I'm more into enjoying food than playing with it. But even if I do 'deconstruct' something, I wouldn't then call it something it's not. A jar of peanut butter and a loaf of bread is not a sandwich.

The traditional definition for pie is "A baked food composed of a shell of pastry that is filled with fruit, meat, cheese, or other ingredients, and usually covered with a pastry crust" _Credit: American Heritage Dictionary. _

That dessert recipe sounds delicious, and some may call it 'pie' if they want to, but it does not fit the definition.


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## chefraz

I have a picutre of a deconstructed sundae we serve at our latin rest. you get the Ingredients brought to you and you put them together in the way you want... if you don't like one item you leave it out...thats what deconstructed means to me.


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## zane

I was googling for deconstructing food and this was the first link that popped up. Unfortunately even though post #2 described what it means I still don't understand it. Help?


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## siduri

amazingrace said:


> Thanks for the replies.
> 
> When I posted the original question, I was feeling rather inadequate for not knowing what this term was supposed to mean. Now, I've decided it's merely pretentious "chef-speak", invented to elevate the dish to a (higher level?) than it actually needs or even ought to have.


Not just chef-speak - it's used in every field, usually pretentiously. I believe (not sure) that it originates in literary criticism, and is usually incomprehensible.


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## amazingrace

siduri said:


> Not just chef-speak - it's used in every field, usually pretentiously. I believe (not sure) that it originates in literary criticism, and is usually incomprehensible.


Thank you for posting this. When I asked the original question, I was feeling sort of inadequate for not knowing or understanding. However, after reading your response, I can now feel superior beccause I no longer need to care. /img/vbsmilies/smilies/lookaround.gif


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## kyheirloomer

The problem is that deconstructed started life with a specific meaning, but has been degraded. Far too often, nowadays, it's what many seem to think: that you merely separate the dish into it's component parts.

Technically, that would meet the standard definition of deconstruct. But in culinary terms, deconstruct means to break apart and then reconstruct in a new manner.

Originally, deconstructed could be the epitomy of the chef's art. What it meant was that you took the ingredients, prepared them in a form different from the original, then recombined them again. The look was different, but when you ate the dish you got the same flavor sensation as the original.

For example, I once saw a deconstructed Ceasar salad that used molecular gastronomy techniques to create a totally different look and feel. The dressing, for instance, was turned into a gel disc that flowed apart when you passed your fork through it. Something else had been done to change the form of the Parmesan. Etc.

Visually it was quite striking, and unlike a regular Ceasar salad. But when you bit into it, you knew that Ceasar is what you were eating.

That's a long way from laying out the greens, cheese, oil, vinegar, egg, and anchovy separately. But, unfortunately (and you can blame the TV chefs for this) that's what it's come to mean.


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## gunnar

KYHeirloomer said:


> The problem is that deconstructed started life with a specific meaning, but has been degraded. Far too often, nowadays, it's what many seem to think: that you merely separate the dish into it's component parts.
> 
> Technically, that would meet the standard definition of deconstruct. But in culinary terms, deconstruct means to break apart and then reconstruct in a new manner.
> 
> Originally, deconstructed could be the epitomy of the chef's art. What it meant was that you took the ingredients, prepared them in a form different from the original, then recombined them again. The look was different, but when you ate the dish you got the same flavor sensation as the original.
> 
> For example, I once saw a deconstructed Ceasar salad that used molecular gastronomy techniques to create a totally different look and feel. The dressing, for instance, was turned into a gel disc that flowed apart when you passed your fork through it. Something else had been done to change the form of the Parmesan. Etc.
> 
> Visually it was quite striking, and unlike a regular Ceasar salad. But when you bit into it, you knew that Ceasar is what you were eating.
> 
> That's a long way from laying out the greens, cheese, oil, vinegar, egg, and anchovy separately. But, unfortunately (and you can blame the TV chefs for this) that's what it's come to mean.


only when done poorly, which I think is a mark of a chef outreaching themselves. Its like like trying to say that a flat bit of cream that has been whipped, is whipped cream. No, it's not...it's a failed or bad attempt at whipped cream. take that loaf of bread and jar of peanut butter reference, that is not a deconstructed dish, those are component ingredients and as KYH said if they were say, a small cube of bread surrounded by jelly with a peanut butter ganache encapsulating it all. Something about the size of a Lindt truffle, that would be a "deconstruction" IF when you popped it into your mouth you were reminded of a pb&j from childhood.

A deconstruction should be able to instantly remind of the original as far as flavor, I believe some different texture is unavoidable in most instances.


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## kyheirloomer

_>I believe some different texture is unavoidable in most instances.<_

I don't think it can be avoided, Gunnar. Nor is it a bad thing.

The whole point, to use your example, is that when you bite into it you feel that you're eating a PB&J sandwich.

_only when done poorly, which I think is a mark of a chef outreaching themselves._

Sadly, it's done poorly more often than not. Some of it is over reaching, as you suggest. But much more of it is cooks and chefs who don't really understand the concept trying to ride a trend.

It's like ChefRaz's example above. To me, that isn't a deconstruction, it's a do-it-yourself sundae.


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## chefedb

Suzanne>>>Great definition


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## siduri

Like much of literary criticism I think the deconstructed caesar salad KY describes is a lot of smoke and little roast (one italian expression that comes to mind, or to take another, fried air - since anything, even hot air, tastes better when fried).

So you spend hours and lots of fancy equipment to make a disk of dressing that will melt when your fork touches it, but in the end it tastes like a regular caesar salad.  Is that all that much different from "fun food" like ice cream that looks like spaghetti and sauce? (squeeze vanilla ice cream through a potato ricer, put strawberry sauce and shredded coconut on top.)  Yes, spaghetti ice cream is very low-brow and can be looked down on, and molecular gastronomy is very high-brow and can be aspired to, but in the end you've done some kind of fun food for very rich people.  What's the difference between this molecular caesar salad and a regular one?  Illusion?  fun?  I bet it is fun to cut a disk and it turns magically into dressing, but beyond that?  Is it really worth the incredible amount of labor and money and equipment it takes to make it? 

Personally, i like food to look like food.  I don't like food that looks like colored erasers kids would use in middle school (some japanese dishes) or like disks or tiny globules like some crazy homeopathic medicine.  Personal taste, i guess.  But i like the texture and roughness and realness of real food. 

I enjoy it nicely presented.  But not at the cost of having a huge dish with a thumbsized portion of something very tasty but that's going to leave me starving, however beautiful it's made to look (and having to pay as if it were a huge portion).


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## kyheirloomer

All you say may be true, Siduri. But the question was, "what is deconstructed." That was the most graphic way I could describe it.

Whether or not you'd like such culinary endeavers is a different subject altogether. In fact, every point you made could apply to all culinary trends and conceits.

One difference between deconstructed and fun food is that deconstructed does, indeed, "look like food." If I served that Ceasar salad to you, or Gunnar PB&J, but in each case called it something else, you wouldn't think twice about sampling it. Of course, once you tasted it, you'd probably say, "Know what? This X salad tastes just like Ceasar."


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## siduri

Sorry KY, i know you were just explaining the concept.  I can see the appeal for a chef to do these sorts of experiments, and maybe even for people to enjoy them, but still, a disk that turns into salad dressing?  May be fun, but does it really enhance the eating experience?  It would give me the creeps.  If i want a salad, i would rather have rough leaves coated nicely in a dressing. 

Anyway, i got interrupted as i was writing the post above and hit submit before i had really finished and edited.  I didn';t mean to undermine your description.


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## boar_d_laze

We're getting pretty far from what "deconstruction" means. I guess that's only appropriate though because it seems like a great many of the TV cooks (often reality show "cheftestants") don't know either.

"Deconstruction," is a kind of philosophical way of looking at the world, but mostly literature, first defined by the contemporary French philosopher, Jacques Derrida.

The basic idea is that in order to understand things (literary works for instance) which are composed of a number of disparate elements, you must separate them into those elements and understand each of them, as well as the synergy which results from their combination.

At a certain level of refinement, cooking can comment on these sorts of things and that's what "deconstructed" food does. When a deconstructed dish works, it's a witty play on modern intellectual life as well a wonderfully surprising way of understanding a dish we ordinarly take for granted.

In addition to understanding those parts of a given dish which are irreducible (cannot be broken into their own components without losing meaning), the cook must also understand how those things work together. For instance, an _amuse bouche_ that's a napoleon of well cooked smoked and chilled beet slices, ultra-thin slices of persian cucumbers and a tarragon creme-fraiche might be a very nice deconstructed borscht; but a plate of grilled steak, roast potatoes and peas and carrots is not a deconstructed stew.

I don't mean to critique anyone else's take on "deconstruction" with this information. Very few Americans take academic philosophy or academic literary criticism seriously enough to have much of a sense of what Derrida was really after. But (a) we probably shouldn't, and (b) I'm not sure that it makes much difference. The idea of deconstruction of breaking down a dish into its most basic elements, then preparing and serving them in a way which highlights their individuality while illuminating the way they work together is pretty inuitive.

BDL


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## philosophos

I know that I'm new here, and I'm not a professional chef, but this sort question fits what I do well. I believe boar_d_laze and the philosopher Derrida have the right idea, but I'd like to toss in some articulation and a little of my own ideas for the culinary world.

To me, deconstruction is about intent. Many breads are a matter of some time sitting and some altered ratios; they are not examples of deconstruction any more than cyanide is a deconstruction of ethanol because of the common hydrocarbons. What seems to makes a deconstruction is the attempt to educate or explore through expressing old things in new ways so as to observe each part of the dish without being interfered with by the other components. One part should be identifiable from the other, and express its self in a way that reveals something about the ingredient or the whole of the dish that it describes. One ingredient should rely on another less heavily than in the original dish, with that separation being taken advantage of in order to offer new perspectives. At the same time, new ingredients should be minimal so as to reduce the interference with the re-learning of the dish being deconstructed.

As our society shifts towards holism, reductionism becomes a means of understanding the in-situ results rather than the entirety of an ex-situ conjecture. Because of this, deconstructionism should be intended to engage someone who is emphatic about the philosophy of cooking rather than just enjoying a good meal. I am not saying that being enjoyable is mutually exclusive to deconstructionism, but rather that the point of deconstructionism is lost for anyone who doesn't want to think about their food.

I don't think deconstruction necessarily has to be served on a plate, or even completely eaten. Stinkhorn eggs are entirely about deconstruction to me. When you pick P. impudicus, the primordial veil turns from white purple within seconds. This outer layer is firm, bouncy, it's texturally and visually appealing. When you peel it off, the jelly underneath is unpleasant and disgusting, but you realize that its structure when bound with the primordeal veil offered its outside texture. From there, the gleba is only the mildly pleasant part of a disgusting smelling ingredient; it will remain this way if you cook it properly. If you cook the gleba wrong, it stinks like rotting flesh as the rest of the mushroom does. So while only one small part makes it to the plate, you understand the ingredient through deconstruction better than if you had only handled the best part. By cleaning one of these mushrooms, I have come to understand it well enough to be able to smell a patch of them before they turn into big, swollen, rather suggestive pillars of fly ridden stench.

Anyhow, that's just me. I usually try to make cooking the unintellectual part of my day, but that doesn't seem to be happening lately.


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## siduri

Thanks BDL, I remembered a french critic but didn't want to look it up - Derrida it is.  I could never read most french authors and have given up - in my field there's Lacan, and there was a time i thought i SHOULD read him, and now i think there is so much to read that is relevant to me and tied to experience that I can not feel too bad to have skipped over him. 

And philosophus, it doesn;t matter if you're not a professional chef.  Interesting explanations. 

Anyway, i do think we should use our intelligence when we cook.  Many of us have our intelligence in our hands (we call it procedural or implicit)  (I do, for one) and we should use this intelligence. Others have it in our heads (verbal intelligence) (i think i have some of that too, but usually it's a translation of my implicit, hand, intelligence). 

What I don;t like about the idea of "deconstruction" is that it breaks things down, and i think we lose the essence of something when we break it down analytically.  Experience is what i think is most important, whether in my own field or in cooking - it's the experience of food that counts. If we lose the experience we lose the whole point of it.  It's ok to want to analyse components, if that's what you like to do, if that helps you understand better - there are different styles of understanding, but they are neither better nor worse.  But it's the experience that counts when you eat. 

Once, when i was a kid, we were having a party at home and i was fixing some creamy dips by smoothing the surface of them carefully and my mother said, no, don;t do that, nobody wants to see that it looks like you've pawed their food too much!  She was phobic about germs, but i think there is something to it - i find food that's been handled too much is fussy and overworked and also a bit disturbing.  I got a wonderfully carved carrot on my dish at a chinese restaurant once, and i carefully put it aside.  I felt it was "pawed" too much.  Not that people shouldn;t touch my food with their hands, that's what cooking is about, and since i think with my hands that's how i do it.  But I don;t want to give a person the idea that the thing on their plate is so precious, like a carrot carved like a buddha, that they will fish it out of my leftovers and put it onto the next person's plate!

Food is food, it's pleasure, it's nourishment, it's experience.  And for some maybe funny globules and disks are part of the experience, and fine.  But deconstructing seems to imply breaking it down and analysing the components, which is not what experience is about.  It's what rationalization is about, it's a different process.  It makes me feel the food is coming from a laboratory, not a living, breathing kitchen with real people and fire and knives and actual biological extremely complex substances and objects like eggplants and onions and the squeezings of olives and the milkings of cows. 

Similarly, novels are written to be read and enjoyed.  If they;re not enjoyable, why read them?  If the enjoyment comes from breaking it apart, then fine for you, but I think you miss what a novel is. 

And if we take it further, I'll plagiarize someone's concept since i don;t remember where it came from.  If some scientists from another galaxy wanted to know what a book was and brought it to their laboratory, they could analyse the shape (lamellae tied together and hinged at one side) and the materials (the chemical components of paper, ink) and the patterns of black marks on the white.  In the end they could write an entire dissertation on what a book is, but would have no more idea of what it is than before they started. 

Same for a caesar salad, i think! 

It's the taste (and experience of it) that counts.  My personal opinion, of course.


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## hungrystudent

From one of the most well known deconstructive texts in America:

"That word you keep saying...I do not think it means what you think it means."

****Disclaimer: I do _NOT_ wish to offend anyone with my post on Deconstruction. I actually spent a good long time trying to decide if I wanted to post or not, but I thought that given what has come before, I might have some way of finally giving back to a forum that has been very helpful to me. I am _not_ implying that people who posted different ideas about what Derrida was looking to accomplish are somehow missing the point - it's just that Derrida is one of the most widely misunderstood, misquoted, and misapplied philosophers that I can think of (second only to Nietzsche, I think). This is mostly because Derrida is a tough read. There are full professors in my department who regularly misapply his work, and these are some smart cookies.****

I hate to do much more than lurk or ask questions on this forum, as I'm still such a neophyte in the kitchen, but I _have_ done a good bit of work with Derrida. For anyone interested in getting a better understanding of how Derrida's usage of the term "deconstruction" works, read "Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences" from _Writing and Difference_. It is a term which is almost always taken to mean a literal destruction of meaning or segmentation of a text, leading to the idea that Derrida's project was about compartmentalizing in order to facilitate further analysis in a manner similar to that of Aristotle. While this is certainly a valid and useful approach, it is not what Derrida had in mind. Nor is looking at the "intersections" of disparate "elements" - that would be more appropriate to the Russian Formalists, or maybe Roland Barthes' earlier work (depending on how exactly you go about it). Oddly enough, Derrida was NOT interested in breaking things apart - that would really be the antithesis of how a decosntructive approach to literature works.

What Derrida meant by deconstruction could best be described as a questioning. A critic will examine a work with a special eye towards conflicts of logic or inconsistencies, and will then apply critical pressure at that juncture. The goal is not to expose the work as a fraud and thereby destroy its credibility or merit, but to understand the assumptions required by the work. Frequently this means questioning concepts which we all "understand", such as hospitality, mourning, or justice. Just as often, it means examining what seems to be an unresolvable opposition (nature vs. society, High vs. Low, etc.). It always means being critically rigorous, especially with regard to one's own tools of inquiry. Derrida encouraged the combination and adaptation of varied analytic techniques in order to get around the perennial roadblocks that each was unable to deal with on its own.

In short, deconstruction is a post-structuralist (post as in it came after, not necessarily replaced, earlier modes of inquiry) method of inquiry motivated by a need to pursue the sorts of contradictions and assumptions which, prior to Derrida's work, were mainly left unexplored (for various reasons).

What does this mean in the kitchen? Well, one of the most idiomatic moves of a deconstructive critic is to work with binary pairs: White and Black, Self and Other, Nature and Art. In the kitchen, one might think "Savory and Sweet" or "Edible and Inedible". I can think of many examples of pastry chefs building sugar creations that look like wine glasses, but while such an endeavor _highlights_ the problem of that particular binary, it doesn't really deconstruct it. If the glasses were meant to be a part of dinner service (but not eaten), that would push the point a bit harder. If they were designed to flavor the beverage poured in them, the chef would be pushing that question even harder. Of course, whether or not that would "deconstruct" the binary of edible/inedible would be in the mind of the beholder (or the artist...or the critic...).

The few times I've seen "deconstructed" on a menu, the dish has been the same food I'd always get plated in a fanciful manner or prepared slightly differently. This dish would be de-constructed in the sense of structurally taken apart, but that alone isn't enough to activate the deeper sorts of thinking implied by the word as used in connection with Derrida's critical approach. This does not, however, mean that the dish is somehow a critical failure. It may be attempting a different type of deconstruction than that which Derrida modeled (which, now that I mention it, is really exactly the sort of thing towards which Derrida seems to be pointing us), or it maybe attempting a different sort of critical investigation all together.

I think that the real problem here (and I use "problem" as a way of denoting a point of profitable exploration) is that cooks don't have the vocabulary to talk about what we do that "artists" (notice the scare-quotes) do. There are a few exceptions, including earlier posters in this thread, but not enough to bring a standardized vocabulary to the discipline. The articulations above regarding what chefs are doing when they say they are "deconstructing" a dish are wonderful examples of the sort of metacritical inquiry that I would love to see appearing more and more frequently.

This definition of "Deconstruction" is VERY skeletal, brief, and simplified. If you'd like to talk more about it, please PM me.


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## rheadewey

So that's what deconstructed means. I've stumbled upon a food name with that word and I didn't touch it because it sounded too complicated >.<


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## kyheirloomer

When done properly, Rheadewey, it can be very complicated. Well, complex is more the word I'd use. You have to be the type who really likes to play with food. And you must understand the synergism that exists between ingredients.

But it can be a lot of fun.


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## philosophos

While doing some further reading, I think deconstructionism is about taking things apart. It seems the entire point of it is to examine the components on their own first, reducing them as far as possible, and then putting them together again in light of eachother. Segregation within food (not the philosophy) as a whole would be a common identifier as the result of examining an ingredient on its own is not precisely how it functions in the whole of the original recipe. The difference between the original and the new should show the difference. I think if we were to get downright snobbish about it, good deconstructionism would serve the dish classically prepared beside what may be multiple deconstructions as an exposition on a dish.

Either way, there needs to be some very good identifiers for this concept as applied to cooking, but clearly there isn't a common consensus. Much like the topic of qualia, it's all indistinguishable hype unless it can be empirically measured as different. Also much like qualia, whether that has or even can happen is a topic of debate.

Anyhow, in regards to intelligence and cooking, I agree for the most part. A few times a year I plan meals out obsessively and attempt to execute ideas with great forethought. Most of the time though, I cook intuitively based on experience; it's a whole lot of muscle memory more than being careful analysis. 95% of the time It's stress relief for me; more of a casual jam session that starts in the store rather than a recital or performance for an audience.


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## chrislehrer

Having spent an inordinate amount of time reading, thinking about, and writing about Derrida and the complex of theoretical systems that claim in one way or another to build on his thought, I want to weigh in here, without unduly repeating what others have said.

First of all, on the academic side, HungryStudent has it just about dead-on, in my view. I have only one disagreement: I do not think that the brilliant essay she or he cites -- "Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences" -- is as accessible as she or he thinks, because it seems to me one has to have read a good deal of high-end Structuralist thought, notably that of the late Claude Lévi-Strauss, in order to see what Derrida is getting at. A good bit of Nietzsche would help too. I agree that the essay is brilliant, seminal, and necessary, but I doubt any reader who hasn't read and mastered rather a lot of Lévi-Strauss is really going to grasp what Derrida is doing, because what he's doing happens at so many levels simultaneously, and not all of them are stated explicitly. I'd rather you just read _Of Grammatology_, which is at least long enough that Derrida has time to tell you what he's doing right at the surface. But it's not a walk in the park by any means....

Without claiming to supersede or disagree with HungryStudent's explication, I would reduce (and it is a reduction) "deconstruction" like this:

Any text (any way of communicating via symbols) is necessarily founded on assumptions, most of which must remain latent in order for the communication to work. This latency ensures that texts are always, to some degree at least, self-contradictory. Looked at under a tight analytical microscope, then, texts will always _deconstruct themselves_: they tear themselves apart. The object of the analytical method is to utilize such microscopes, not because we wish to destroy texts, but because we wish to understand the tensions between the latent assumptions and the communication efforts that depend upon them and their latencies.

What's this got to do with food? Usually nothing. But it could.

Suppose we take a well-known and beloved dish. We take it apart into component pieces, and we consider what these pieces are and how they contribute to the known dish. We now recombine all these elements in such a way that they no longer look, feel, or taste quite the same as they did before. And yet, when we eat the dish, somehow it seems like a perfect example of the original dish. This raises, for the _eater_, a question: why does this thing I have just eaten challenge what I thought this dish actually was? What am I assuming, without even realizing it?

Now suppose we do this at the level of a whole cuisine, or even just a very large set of courses in a tasting menu. The questions begin to arise: What do we think "a meal" is, and why? What sorts of assumptions and principles guide our experience of "fine dining," and where do they really come from? Are these assumptions in fact based on anything real, or are they just a perpetuation of somebody's aesthetics -- in which case whose, and why do we perpetuate them?

A rather good example is Anthony Bourdain's little film, I think originally part of his "No Reservations" show, on Ferran Adria. Bourdain, like so many chefs, is deeply committed to the notion of "simplicity" -- _la nouvelle cuisine_, in essence. Adria seems to be about as far removed from "simplicity" as it is possible to be, using gels and spherification and all this crazy stuff. But over the course of the program, Bourdain finds himself confronting some unsettling questions: What does "simplicity" actually mean? Why is it necessarily superior? For example, what makes us think of wine or _jamon Iberico_ as "simple," when these things are the result of years of complicated manipulations? Bourdain doesn't, on the whole, think terribly deeply about these questions, but it seems to me he is correct in thinking that Adria wants his diners to ask them -- and keep asking them, again and again.

Thus a serious deconstructive approach to food, in my judgment, would have only one fundamental principle: it would seek to challenge the eater to think wildly differently about the food eaten, by seeking to bring to consciousness the assumptions we eaters make. This process should be exciting, stimulating, funny, surprising, and simultaneously intellectual and aesthetic. It cannot be done halfway: one cannot simply take a dish apart and claim it as deconstruction in this sense, because this challenges nothing, and more importantly asks the diner for no challenge --- it's just taking a dish apart.

Derrida's thought was, in very short order, twisted and distorted into all kinds of cheap nonsense. (To be sure, some of the twisted, distorted versions were neither cheap nor nonsense --- to follow Derrida is to twist and distort his work, by definition!) Just so, I think the use of the term "deconstruction" in food as in other areas has usually been cheap and banal. But it doesn't have to be. Serious deconstruction, in food as in philosophy, depends on an intensive intellectual and aesthetic engagement with very deep problems, and it is immensely difficult.

The question is whether you, as a cook, whoever you might be, see any particular value or interest in these aims. Most cooks, I think, do not. Fine -- deconstruction in food has not reached the point that anyone need necessarily engage with it. But if these aims do not excite you, I for one would hope that you'd avoid the term. Unfortunately, "deconstructed" has come to be used to mean "taken apart in bits so I can charge you a lot more for it and have you think you're very gourmet." And this is not unlike what "deconstruction" usually came to mean in literary criticism, so this is not an attack on cooks as such. Myself, I wish the term could remain on the fringe, used only by people who actually think this is an interesting way of going about things.

That said, Derrida had a lot to say about why terms like this always get absorbed in this sort of way....


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## boar_d_laze

This is great stuff.  A discussion of food semiotics with people who can actually cook.  Chef Talk kicks!

BDL


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## siduri

Chris,

I never thought to learn what deconstructtion means and to understand anything about someone so inaccessible as Derrida in a cooking forum!!! Great explanation!

Doesn't mean i will go looking at derrida any day soon. I think there are "ways" or "styles" of thinking, and some are more congenial to some and others are more congenial to others. I think i'm on the far opposite end of "ways of thinking" from derrida, and while i can appreciate that we can understand what are the underlying latent assumptions behind a thought or communication, but i think my way to do that would be very different than his. I do it all the time in therapy, for instance, but it is very concrete, very experiential, very much transmitted, for instance, with metaphors and gestures, and never abstract. But anyway, I'm glad i waded through these posts and understood something. 


ChrisLehrer said:


> The question is whether you, as a cook, whoever you might be, see any particular value or interest in these aims. Most cooks, I think, do not. Fine -- deconstruction in food has not reached the point that anyone need necessarily engage with it. But if these aims do not excite you, I for one would hope that you'd avoid the term. Unfortunately, "deconstructed" has come to be used to mean "taken apart in bits so I can charge you a lot more for it and have you think you're very gourmet." And this is not unlike what "deconstruction" usually came to mean in literary criticism, so this is not an attack on cooks as such. Myself, I wish the term could remain on the fringe, used only by people who actually think this is an interesting way of going about things.


Very good point.


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## hungrystudent

Chris,

Wonderful post. I think you did an excellent job distinguishing between the actual taking-apart of food as one (I would claim incidental) part of a larger process which aims to deconstruct, and the common practice of pretending that this process is, in fact, deconstruction. It makes me wish I hadn't replied to this thread late last night, but had bookmarked it to come back later - I look like a total hack in my post. Out of curiosity, where did you study?

As for "Structure, Sign, and Play", I didn't mean to imply that it was accessible, but that it was a good place to get a feel for Derrida's project. In particular, I think that one can understand his usage of _bricolage_ (which I feel is absolutely paramount to understanding his larger project) without doing much other reading. Honestly, the best way to _really_ get to know Derrida's work is to pick up a sort of silly looking book called _How To Read Derrida_ (Norton, 2005) - it's a part of a series on several of the "big" philosophers which (I feel) does an excellent job balancing accessibility with utility. I would say that any highschool graduate willing to spend a little time thinking could read that book (Something like 150 pages long) and have a very workable understanding of Derrida (or Foucault, Freud, Marx - it's really a great series).

On the subject of speaking academically about cooking, I've just started reading _Culinary__ Artisty_. When I finish it up I have a feeling I'll starting a thread looking for some theoretical closure, and I'd love to see everyone here stop by. As I said in my last post, I'm relatively new to the kitchen, but I sure am loving every minute of it (except the times I've had bacon grease jump on me).


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## chrislehrer

HungryStudent,

My worry about that essay is merely that I think one cannot really grasp what Derrida means by _bricolage_ (or, for that matter, differance) without having a good understanding of what Derrida is doing to Levi-Strauss, and Levi-Strauss's famous coinage (_bricolage_) has been so grotesquely abused in so many contexts that this is not a simple matter. But I agree with you that this is a most fundamental essay, containing a great many of Derrida's deepest early insights.

I was at University of Chicago, as you might guess.

I do like the book you referenced. Personally, I prefer Christopher Norris's much earlier introduction, _Derrida_, but it's very much 6 of 1, half-a-dozen of the other.

I look forward to your thread on theory and food, although I still haven't gotten around to buying my own copy of _Culinary Artistry_ --- I keep trying to get people to buy me a copy as a present, and it never seems to pan out. Maybe I'll have to break down and do it myself....

In passing, I am still uncertain as to whether Ferran Adria intends "deconstruction" in anything like the sense I infer via Derrida, but I do think it sort of pans out that way. I'm going to be doing a bunch of reading up on Adria, though, and hope to come to some conclusions that way.


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## amazingrace

Well, pardon me while I play the grand piano. /img/vbsmilies/smilies/lookaround.gif


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## chrislehrer

I believe the line is, "no more scones for me, mater, I'm off to play the grand piano." /img/vbsmilies/smilies/tongue.gif

I wrote an extensive further comment, but realized it could only appear pretentious and frankly masturbatory, so I deleted it. Some day....


----------



## mikelm

Makes my head hurt.

Thank God I got all my degrees (and I've got some pretty good degrees) before all these Frogs showed up to muddy the waters.

The book that talked to me (having absolutely nothing to do with deconstruction) was _Language In Action_ by the snoozing senator from California, Sam Hiakawa, which was a popular explication of Alfred Korzybski's very much denser _Science and Sanity - the Theory of General Semantics _(as near as I can remember the title_)_, which might as well been written in his native Polish language, as far as I was concerned. It is a brilliant insight into how language shapes our thoughts and lives, and one that good ol" Sam makes entirely accessible. He published a revision, _Language In Thought and Action,_ which I would heartily recommend to anyone who has any interest in language, advertising, political speech, and writing in general.

Google Samuel I. Hiakawa for more info about him. He was the President of San Francisco State College in California and was also noted for his reaction to the student radicals of the late 1960's. When they showed up to take over his college, he called in the State Police and crushed them like bugs. There were no more sit-ins, disruptions, or riots at San Fransisco College (as opposed to, say, Harvard, Columbia, or other august institutions). The kids got what they came for - an education. This was what got him elected to the Senate.) He's one of my early heroes - for the books, not especially for the crackdown on disrupters, though that wasn't so bad either.

but Derrida - not so much

Mike


----------



## rheadewey

KYHeirloomer said:


> When done properly, Rheadewey, it can be very complicated. Well, complex is more the word I'd use. You have to be the type who really likes to play with food. And you must understand the synergism that exists between ingredients.
> 
> But it can be a lot of fun.


In that case I don't think I'm ready for this. I'm the type who gets boggled up when things get too confusing and hard to follow in a certain recipe  Will save this when I get to a higher level


----------



## petalsandcoco

I do not believe that it is about obtaining the next level of cooking, its more about using the imagination and having new outlook on what a dish is, “ what it is suppose to be compared to what it can become .”

Foodiebuddha once said :

“At heart, any decontructed dish should contain all the classic components found in the “original”. The difference is in the preparation . When creating a dish utilizing deconstructive techniques, the ingredients are essentially prepared and treated on their own. It is during the plating and presentation stages that everything is brought together “.

Not that long ago I tasted a deconstructed French onion soup and it was wonderful. Having fun in the kitchen is important l as KYH said.

While Wylie Dufresne has done alot in this area , I think that Heston Blumenthal and Adria and Fergus Henderson all excel at such ideas.


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## boar_d_laze

We're losing "deconstruction" in cooking in favor of "deconstruction" as a form of academic philolosophy and even more academic literary criticism.

The point of "deconstruction" in cooking is understanding common dishes in terms of their irreducible elements, then preparing and presenting them accordingly. Within a very narrow context "irreducibility" is the key. That is, there's some limit beyond which breaking things down and/or removing ingredients and techniques loses the dish's true identity.

(_"True identity" is the object of the exercise. As philosophies we can see the relationship between "deconstrucitonism" and neo-Platonic "idealism" in a thoughtfully deconstructed dish._)

Taken in a broader context deconstructing a dish is about the way the cook injects aspects of her or his personality (in this case, intellect) to surprise, amuse, and inform the diner. And of course the food must be delicious.

"Deconstructing" is not something you do following a recipe. It takes a level of technical skills and palate which come after a lot of practice and effort -- if they come at all. On the other hand, a cook can certainly do a good job of cooking and plating someone else's deconstructed dish by following instructions and learn a great deal in the process.

I dunno. Maybe we should start a thread on how advanced cooks "personalize" food.

BDL

PS. IMO Hayakawa was a mediocrity as a semanticist and academic administrator but a disaster as a US senator. You've got to give him "A" for good intentions for _Language in Action_ which was written simplistically to help unsophisticated Americans understand the danger of Nazi Propaganda.

_Language in Thought and Action_ was better fleshed out, but also written at a very simple level. I can't recommend it to anyone already sophisticated enough to understand the difference between metaphor and simile. Speaking of which, the thing I remember most from _Language in Thought and Action_ (a gag gift, not a textbook) was the line, "He is not a pig. He is like a pig."

Call me easy, but there's something about unintentional irony which gets me every time.

PPS. I was in the midst of writing this when my friend Chef Petals posted. "Yes" to everything she wrote.


----------



## joanjett

I came here with the same question as amazingrace, and I am happy I found this forum. I have not drawn the same conclusion that deconstructing a dish is somehow "pretentious," but I do see how some could arrive at that conclusion. Also, I think that some here are debating not the _pretentiousness_ of deconstructing dishes, but the _semantics_ of deconstruction.

As for me, I simply wanted to be able to watch television cooking competitions with some degree of intelligence and understanding. The excellent comments here provided ample information for me to grasp the concept of deconstruction enough to enjoy it now when it is discussed on television. Thanks to everyone who contributed.

*-edited by moderator*


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## onei

I think deconstructed means a chef has a traditional dish that he is a bit embarrassed to serve because it isn't something he/she came up with. But if they stick 'deconstructed' in front of the name, well it sounds like something new. When really it isn't.


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## oldisbest

No, that means you are too lazy to prepare a proper dessert.


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## petalsandcoco

JoanJett said:


> I came here with the same question as amazingrace, and I am happy I found this forum. I have not drawn the same conclusion that deconstructing a dish is somehow "pretentious," but I do see how some could arrive at that conclusion. Also, I think that some here are debating not the _pretentiousness_ of deconstructing dishes, but the _semantics_ of deconstruction.
> 
> As for me, I simply wanted to be able to watch television cooking competitions with some degree of intelligence and understanding. The excellent comments here provided ample information for me to grasp the concept of deconstruction enough to enjoy it now when it is discussed on television. Thanks to everyone who contributed.
> 
> *-edited by moderator*


I would like to personally thank you for your kind words and for " grasping " the sense of this topic. I have made far too many desserts, with much time, research, pairing, decorating, pushing my abilities past to just what a recipe can offer but to think outside the box, and I would hate to think that I have done all this because I was "lazy"......nothing wrong with pushing the envelope a little, that is why we have such wonderful culinary envisionaries before us because they chose to raise the bar a little. My Red hat goes off to them.


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## janeclark78

Constructed means built something or was able to put up something together. So DECONSTRUCTED means abolished, destroyed, ruined. hope this meaning works./img/vbsmilies/smilies/smiles.gif


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## Guest

Koukouvagia said:


> Yes it can be pretentious but it's not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes deconstructing a dish can make it easier to prepare. The oyster example I believe is the height of pretention and quite a bad example. Let me give you an example of something I deconstruct that's not so pretentious.
> 
> Apple Pie Deconstructed
> 
> Filling
> -5-6 golden delicious apples cut into 1/2 inch cubes
> -1 cinammon stick
> -freshly grated nutmeg
> -2 tbsp brown sugar
> -1/4 cup bailey's irish cream
> -1/2 stick butter
> 
> Crust
> -frozen puff pastry defrostred
> -powdered sugar
> -powdered cinnamon
> 
> 1. Preheat the oven to 400
> 2. With a rolling pin roll out the puff pastry
> 3. sprinkle with cinamon and sugar, fold over, and roll again. Repeat this process at least one more time. Cut into single serving triangles or squares.
> 4. Stick in the oven until puffed.
> 5. On the stove top combine the filling ingredients and simmer for 1/2 hour or until as gooey as you like.
> 
> Plate:
> Place one puff on a plate. Top with apple goo. Then top with custard (homemade and warm I hope).
> 
> Why do I deconstruct my apple pie? So I can make as much as I like, where as 1 whole apple pie might be too much. So i can top my puff with as much as little apple filling as I like.
> 
> I'm willing to bet that you deconstruct a lot of food that you make without even realizing it.


I love the way you put this... Very simple....The recipe also sounds delicious.. I am going to try it.. My family loves pies.. but are prone to leaving more than half to ruin.. so this is a great solution.. Thanks


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## greyeaglem

Where is the description of deconstructed oyster chowder everyone's talking about? I remember laughing hysterically at a post some time back here on Cheftalk about how to make a deconstructed oyster chowder. I thought of it right away when I saw the thread and hoped it would be reposted. It was probably Suzanne's, and I would like to read it again, but for some reason I don't see the link to it. Am I just blind?


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## petalsandcoco

Chef Jose Andres: _New England Clam Chowder_

_http://www.starchefs.com/chefs/JAndres/html/recipes/New_England_Clam_Chowder_j_andres.shtml _


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## cookthisspot

An older thread, true, but adding my 2 teaspoons to the mix.  

I found ChefTalk in the same manner as, and for the same reason as, JoanJett.  The level of intensity and investment that went into this discussion is astounding! A person has to respect the spirit of the exchange.  It was enlightening. 

Thanks much.  Enjoyed it.


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## Guest

Yes you have it right, it is to make all or part of the whole into individual pieces, and then use thoses pieces to make your dish. Also known as a "mock". But it is still what it is. Just prepared differently.So if I where to make a Spanish Paella, I would fry the chicken completely and the sausage, put it aside. Saute my veggies, put those aside. Have my rice already cooked and have a warm chicken stock with Old Bay and crushed tomatoes in a bane-Marie. Now I get a chit for Spanish Paella. I put rice with stock, veg. chicken on top, throw it in the oven for 10mins. and it is ready to serve.This technique is not new,and has been used for many,many years. Some chefs would call it mise en place.Its a real time saver if you know you are going to get a big rush at 8.


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## boar_d_laze

Taj Maczka said:


> Yes you have it right, it is to make all or part of the whole into individual pieces, and then use thoses pieces to make your dish. Also known as a "mock". But it is still what it is. Just prepared differently.So if I where to make a Spanish Paella, I would fry the chicken completely and the sausage, put it aside. Saute my veggies, put those aside. Have my rice already cooked and have a warm chicken stock with Old Bay and crushed tomatoes in a bane-Marie. Now I get a chit for Spanish Paella. I put rice with stock, veg. chicken on top, throw it in the oven for 10mins. and it is ready to serve.This technique is not new,and has been used for many,many years. Some chefs would call it mise en place.Its a real time saver if you know you are going to get a big rush at 8.


Stunning.

BDL


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## gobblygook

I've also seen "deconstructed" used on "Chopped" to mean taking a part of a dish and removing it.  They had a bread with a potato center, and the "chef" "deconstructed" it and used the potato.


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## tylerm713

gobblygook said:


> I've also seen "deconstructed" used on "Chopped" to mean taking a part of a dish and removing it. They had a bread with a potato center, and the "chef" "deconstructed" it and used the potato.


Chopped can be quite amusing. Some of the things they think of (and don't think of) surprise me at times.


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## kyheirloomer

So, here's a question for y'all.

"Deconstruction" is one of those terms that is used so incorrectly, so often, that most people think the wrong interpretation is the true gelt. We have seen, for instance, how for some folks, even professionals, rearranging the components on a plate is deconstruction, and leaving out ingredients is deconstruction, and even using mise en place as a synonum.

So, here's the question: At what point does a term become used in it's incorrect form so often that it becomes the right form?

I would guess, from observation, that dividing a dish into its' component parts and physically separating them on a plate is the most often misuse of the term. So, has that now become the correct usage?


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## tylerm713

KYHeirloomer said:


> I would guess, from observation, that dividing a dish into its' component parts and physically separating them on a plate is the most often misuse of the term. So, has that now become the correct usage?


No. I still don't think it's the correct usage. Simply preparing individual components would be unassembled, not deconstructed. At least in my mind. Then again, maybe I'm wrong too.


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## chrisbelgium

A key element of deconstructed food is that it has to involve a generally wellknow dish/recipe otherwise it's just another dish or recipe.

Just plating it's seperate elements is not a goal as such. There will be a fundamental reinterpretation of the dish/recipe, separating elements if necessary, but -second key element- there must always be a new visual and tasting unity that can easily be recognized as being the original dish/recipe. My 2ct.


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## kyheirloomer

Tyler and Chris: I agree 100% with what both of you have said.

My point was that if you watch the so-called professionals on the food shows, and what they call deconstructed, you have to wonder. Or at least I do.


----------



## tylerm713

KYHeirloomer said:


> if you watch the so-called professionals on the food shows, and what they call deconstructed, you have to wonder.


I sometimes wonder about the credentials of the contestants on Chopped. I rememeber seeing one where the guy made a "deconstructed fish taco". The only things it had in common with a fish taco was the fish and red onions.


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## tkchef

I think a good simple example of a deconstructed dish that seems to being growing in popularity these days is the Deconstructed Chicken Pot Pie. (work with me - this is not the Food Network /img/vbsmilies/smilies/chef.gif.

Prepared without a tin or dish with no crusty base, it is served on a plate with a flaky baked rosemary crust placed on top (centered, but not to the edges) just prior to serving, with a separately prepared light, creamy sauce within an inch of the edge, loaded with slightly crunchy veggies and chicken prepared with herbs de province and cracked pepper in olive oil, sliced and added in just prior to serving...two forms of deconstruction - both in preparation and presentation.

On an Iron Chef episode one of the competitors "deconstructed" as he put it, a dish to better separate the consistency of the ingredients, and emphasize the flavors, which makes sense. He didn't win though.

I guess there is more than one form of deconstruction. Now I'm hungry! Off to the kitchen...


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## gobblygook

I'm beginning to think I just don't like the word at all.  The best use for it I could find would be "reverse engineering" a finished dish to determine the component parts so you could duplicate it.  But even that doesn't agree with anyone else's views of what it means.


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## homemadecook

I'm also confused now. Can't we just one term to use in cooking? /img/vbsmilies/smilies//biggrin.gif


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## chrislehrer

Frankly, I don't think the judges on "Chopped" are nearly intelligent enough that even Adria could do serious deconstructive cuisine with them. They're also so arrogant and self-righteous that they would never actually question themselves and their assumptions as they ate. Deconstructive aesthetics, as I see it, is necessarily a conversation, and the "Chopped" judges refuse any such engagement.

Consider the basic setup, in three dishes: appetizer, main course, dessert. Suppose you challenged this with an appetizer that was both quite delicious and did not match any sort of normal expectations for an appetizer. I mean, suppose they gave you miso, oysters, and eggplant, just to pull three things out of a hat. So you produce an elaborate construction with the eggplant turned into ladyfingers lining a bowl, miso and oyster transmuted into something that looks basically like chocolate truffles in a pudding, then unmolded it and topped it with chile-flavored pulled sugar in a flower. So it appears to be an old-fashioned piece of _haute cuisine_ pastry, and the combination of flavors and textures is frankly bizarre --- yet quite palatable and utterly unlike anything you've ever eaten. Then you label it "deconstructed" something-or-other.

I think the "Chopped" judges would trash this. They'd say they had no idea what it was, and the textures and flavors were weird. The flavor of the eggplant and oysters were not those clean, simple flavors that they "should" have. The pulled sugar and the appearance look like dessert. What the heck, you're clearly a pretentious idiot, you fail. Chopped.

Now I'm not saying that this dish I made up out of nothing is a good idea, or could be done in the time. But it would certainly challenge expectations. Every reason the judges might have for rejecting it would be the reasons they should be thinking, "hmm, maybe 'appetizer' isn't quite so stable or certain a category as I thought; this guy makes me think about things, so clearly this is very serious cuisine." Would they do that? No.

Their whole position is that cuisine is a bar they set, and you, the contestant, may not challenge the nature or structure of that bar. But deconstructive cuisine is nothing if it does not level that kind of challenge.

I continue to maintain that deconstruction in cuisine is not something anyone needs to do or believe in, nor is it "the next level." To do it, you certainly need exceedingly good technique and a penetrating, creative, inquisitive mind, but there are other kinds of cuisine that are just as difficult and creative. But deconstruction and popular media trash have never gotten along well. Someone once asked Derrida if "Seinfeld" was deconstructive, and he replied that he did not think a TV sitcom could ever be deconstructive, by definition. Snobby? Elitist? Sure --- he was a high-end philosopher. But as it happens I think he was probably right. And the same goes for cuisine: nothing you are likely to see on _Iron Chef_ or _Chopped_ or the like is going to be deconstructive; even on the old Japanese _Iron Chef_, which was considerably more radical, this kind of intense challenge did not generally sit well with the judges.


----------



## kyheirloomer

One minor disagreement, Chris. I think a true deconstruction would not only be understood, it would be appreciated on the original Iron Chef. The judges were much more food knowldgeable, on one hand, and more open to new experiences on the other, then is generally true about the American version.

Think, for instance, about when Morimota first became Iron Chef Japanese. His Americanized view of Japanese food was often criticized ahead of time. He was personally attacked by much of the Japanese food community. And the former holder of that position openly bad-mouthed him on several occasions. And yet, not only did he continually win his challenges, he did it by huge margins.

As for Chopped, fogedaboutid! I never understood why anyone would voluntarily subject themselves to that sort of abuse by judges like, say, Scott Conant---who's culinary viewpoint is dictated by a set of cast-in-concrete rules based on falacious traditions. I sometimes think an original dish and a cold glass of water really would kill him. And the other regulars aren't a whole lot better. So, yeah, a true deconstruction would be neither understood nor approved by them. But they love the idea of separating food into its component parts, lining them up on a plate, and calling that deconstructed.


----------



## house husband

lol if serving a topping on a fancy cracker is deconstruction then ive been doing this since i was about 4 my mom tought me heres the recipe

1    saltine cracker

1    tsp peanut butter

1/2 tsp jelly (i like grape)

spread peanut butter on cracker then aply jelly you can add as little or as much as you want of either pb or j ..... i have anothe one with cheese and mustard but im saving that for next top chef .....  i really thought there was more to it but its ok i hope someone thinks of this the next time they watch some fancy cooking show.... or better yet does anyone have a recipe for deconstructed meat loaf with bread?


----------



## chefedb

All well and good . Now let me see yo take apart the penut butter, cracker, and grape jelly . Break them each down from their  now state,  to their seperate  complex chemical components. .


----------



## kyheirloomer

I'm sure HouseHusband had his tongue in his cheek, Ed. But I'm just as sure he, and others, can be greatly confused if they watch cooking shows on TV. More times than not the celebrity chefs use "deconstruction" incorrectly. So most folks who watch them can easily believe that all it means is that you separate the ingredients and lay them out on a plate, rather than group them together in the usual fashion.

The way the technique is commonly used, HouseHusband doesn't have to break them down to chemical components. All he need do is take a strangely shaped plate (perhaps a half-moon). Put a dollop of peanut butter at one end, pile up some crackers (ideally, broken in smaller pieces) in the middle, and paint some grape jelly at the other end. Voila! Deconstructed PB&J.

And then the judges (if it's something like Chopped) can argue whether using smooth or chunky peanut butter makes a difference.


----------



## house husband

chefedb said:


> All well and good . Now let me see yo take apart the penut butter, cracker, and grape jelly . Break them each down from their now state, to their seperate complex chemical components. .


i apologize for not quoting originally but this was in reference to the the "deconstructed sunday" earlyer in the thread. im certainly not Trying to discredit your "art"


----------



## siduri

KYHeirloomer said:


> The way the technique is commonly used, HouseHusband doesn't have to break them down to chemical components. All he need do is take a strangely shaped plate (perhaps a half-moon). Put a dollop of peanut butter at one end, pile up some crackers (ideally, broken in smaller pieces) in the middle, and paint some grape jelly at the other end. Voila! Deconstructed PB&J.


Yeah, ky, you got it there, you "paint" the jelly on the dish.

Never enough to satisfy! Never on TOP of whatever it is supposed to add flavor to!


----------



## chrislehrer

So...


house husband said:


> lol if serving a topping on a fancy cracker is deconstruction then ive been doing this since i was about 4 my mom tought me heres the recipe
> 
> 1 saltine cracker
> 
> 1 tsp peanut butter
> 
> 1/2 tsp jelly (i like grape)
> 
> spread peanut butter on cracker then aply jelly you can add as little or as much as you want of either pb or j ..... i have anothe one with cheese and mustard but im saving that for next top chef ..... i really thought there was more to it but its ok i hope someone thinks of this the next time they watch some fancy cooking show.... or better yet does anyone have a recipe for deconstructed meat loaf with bread?


See, my question here -- recognizing that your tongue is pretty deeply in your cheek, after all -- would be why and in what context you're doing this. I'm fooling around, but also perfectly serious.

If the point is "ta da! deconstruction!" the way most of the hacks who throw the term around use it, you are dead right: your deconstructed PB&J is precisely like theirs. You have one major advantage over them, though, in that you are using the device to prick the pretentious balloon in question.

But could we imagine a situation in which this could actually be serious cuisine?

Suppose we decided to play with the idea of "comfort food," which seems to mesmerize Americans these days. Basically "comfort food" means the stuff we associate with Mom, childhood, whatever, right? Okay, so PB&J would have to be in there. So it seems to me that one dimension of the challenge of thinking this way would be to make the diner think, "what's so comforting about this? Why do I even like it?" I mean, is it the fat content, or the bland flavors, or the low level of work, or what? Now in that context, I could imagine taking your recipe and framing it to drive toward extremes, basically setting the diner up to have to make and eat his own PB&J _with knife and fork_. Essentially you'd shift the contextual situation so radically that it feels weird to just pick the thing up and bite into it. So is it still PB&J if you have to use finicky utensils and a really overwrought process to eat it?

It'd be very hard to pull off, and it would depend on a whole meal context, but I could see that working. It's tricky stuff.


----------



## siduri

My first peanut butter and jelly sandwich was in kindergarten when normally we left school at noon to go home and eat, but this time there was some show or something where the parents were invited, and we were given lunch.  Lunch was a large box of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches delivered to the room, and they had been sitting one on top of the other so that the ones on the bottom were completely squished. 

I loved that sandwich.  I can still taste it.  I was used to our Italian type sandwiches, old dry rolls with prosciutto that was hard to bite, or capocollo, or salame, or slices of italian bread with the crust that but into your gums - hardly what a 5-year-old likes.  Soft bread, and squished down, too, with the peanut butter dense with the jelly.  I can still feel the bite of it.  I had never had it before.  My mother scorned every element of it - soft bread, peanut butter, grape jelly. 

Now, Chris, do you mean that deconstructed means to figure out just what it was of that experience i liked and to eliminate the unnecessary elements, and/or to try to figure out what are unnecessary to it, and what is necessary?

The bite of it was important

the smell of peanutbutter, the absence of any need to chew hard or pull on fibers of meat.

jam without any seeds or skins, cool sweetness without any distractions between the teeth.

The soft squashed nature of the bread. 

the biting through of layers. 

the accompanying milk, in cartons, sipped through a straw

So, say, i could make a stacked pile of layers of soft bready stuff (i'm thinking like a dobostorte, where each layer is only 1/4 cm thick, but it would have to be salty and only a hint of sweet, and preferably yeasted) - or the bread could be pressed down just right -  with many alternate layers of softness and sparkling transparent cool, fruity sweetness.  It could be cut into bite sized pieces of interesting kid-like shapes (star, cube, circle) and eaten with a toothpick or with the fingers (no fork and knife which is the antithesis of comfort food).  It could have similar shaped little boxes of milk with straws, one gulp-doses.  These could be piled up with the blocks of pbj.

Would that be deconstructing my architypical peanut butter and jelly sandwich?


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## sarahg

Well, it means to take something apart (deconstruction) and analyze it.  So in food, you would be breaking down a particular recipe and then assembling it back together in such a way that the re-arrangement of its' constituent elements indicates your analysis and interpretation of that particular dish and usually ends up looking very unique and different form the original creation...


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## petemccracken

sarahg said:


> Well, it means to take something apart (deconstruction) and analyze it. So in food, you would be breaking down a particular recipe and then assembling it back together in such a way that the re-arrangement of its' constituent elements indicates your analysis and interpretation of that particular dish and usually ends up looking very unique and different form the original creation...


Isn't that two steps, deconstruction and then reconstruction? Or maybe re-creation?


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## sarahg

Sure it is, but that's what it actually entails


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## beatz416

A cool Idea I came up with for a deconstructed Peanut Butter and banana sandwich 

 Make peanut butter Ice cream and serve ice cream  over two pieces of warm banana bread 

 A childhood classic with a modern twist to incorporate it into a dessert


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## lesorcier

This thread is making my eyes bubble.

The smarter a person is, the simpler they can make something.  As Einstein said, you don't understand something until you can explain it to your grandmother.


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## steve tphc

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I had never heard of Derrida and when I turned to an article explaining "deconstruction" with its metaphysical properties my head exploded. I was reminded of college days when the likes of Nietzsche gave rise to headaches of biblical proportions. Not withstanding former President Bill Clinton postulating of the true meaning of "is" is, according to both Webster's Dictionary and the crew of the American Heritage Dictionary, a word means is what the MAJORITY of people think it means.

De-construct to me means to un-construct. I am quite certain that deconstructing a Picasso into paint and canvas would not produce the effect that the painter intended. But I too am not a professional chef nor food critic.


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## lesorcier

> Nietzsche gave rise to headaches of biblical proportions


Amen to that!


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## foodpump

I had a dream about deconstructing some good old fashioned comfort food the other night...

I dreamt I had just won accolades for my deconstructed Caesar salad.

For the romaine, I had converted the lettuce to juice, then made a caviar with it with my spherification chemistry set. The balls were scattered around the plate, dribbles and drabs of evoo were artistically arranged, garlic infused lemon peel brunoise lightly scattered, but the center of the plate--ah, the masterpiece!! At the very center was a *socle*, and altar if you like, of freshly baked brioche, and draped over this altar was a freshly fileted anchovy.

then I woke up, brushed my teeth, and went to work.......


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## lucas82

Now, in Italy, starts to talk about Molecular gastronomy...


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## harrisonh

At it's best, it is as Suzanne described. I've seen some remarkable deconstructed dishes.

But I've seen some really stupid ones too. In reality, in many, if not most places, it is simply a fad that needs to go away. 

I place most deconstructed dishes from most line cooks in the same category as:
1 sleeveless turtlenecks (if it's cols enough to need a turtleneck, it's cold enough to need sleeves and if it's not enough to go sleeveless, it's too hot for a turtleneck)
2 skinny jeans for men
3 carpis/pedal pushers for men
4 highheeled converse chuck taylors.


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## jlopez62

Recently I've come across this term my self and keep running to it often. Best Chefs in the world are deconstructing by gathering very old recipes from they are from, most of the time, taking them apart and reconstructing them with modern ingredients and techniques to astonishing results of culinary marvels. Examples are the Chef at NOMA René Redzepi, Heston Blumenthall of the Fat Duck, for example.The real pioneer is the Spanish Basque Chef 'Juan Mari Arzak'; http://www.theworlds50best.com/list/1-50-winners/arzak.
Hope this can help! JON


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## marttakelly

I just learned about this concept last night and in one word: Dislike.  I ordered a chicken pot pie at a "gourmet" restaurant last night. Nowhere on the menu did it say anything about deconstructed.  The last time I heard this term was in college when I studied literature and poetry.

Well, the dish they brought out to me did not, in any way, shape or form, resemble a pot pie.  For one thing, there was no crust to be found.  All it was was a chicken breast on the bone surrounded by a paltry mix of carrots, peas, onions and broth.  The food was good but not great and certainly not worth what they were charging.  I called the water over, just to be sure I had gotten the correct dish.  He said, "Oh, so sorry, I forgot the crust!" He comes back with what a looked like a flat bread stick of sorts.  Very tasty, I might add, but would hardly call it crust.

Needless to say, I was very disappointed and went away hungry. This was not my idea of a pot pie. I will not be returning to this restaurant.  If this dish had been described better on the menu, I would not have ordered it but have selected something else.

As a diner, I don't understand why someone would enjoy the concept of deconstructed food.  Just my 2 cents.


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## davidchef

Deconstruction is the word Ferran Adria used instead of molecular gastronomy, To sum up, is to cook traditional dishes in different textures such as spherification, foams, gelatins... etc.


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