The pressure from that giant knife block your mom gave you could be overwhelming.
Then cut the plank straight across with parallel strokes to get thin, long rectangles.
Slow cooking, stewing, or braising break down the structure and youll lose the veggies to the sauce.
Add julienned beets and carrots to salads, or deep fry julienne potatoes for crispy haystacks.
Chiffonade
One of my favorite cuts is the chiffonade.
Its common to chiffonade leafy greens and wide herbs into a graceful tangle of tumbling strips.
you could chiffonade in thin strips or make the cuts farther apart for wide ribbons.
The cuts will come off in large rings at first.
Chiffonade mint or basil leaves to top off fruity summer desserts.
Cutting them like this will release their powerful aromas more so than leaving them whole.
This cut is similar in shape to the julienne but gigantic in size by comparison.
Hack away to an even bigger size, and if someone gives you trouble, just call them batons.
Use the sturdy batonnet cut for lightly roasted vegetables, gentle sauteeing, or casual snacking.
A brunoise is no different.
The goal of this cut is to make the ingredient look like perfect miniature cubes.
Simply take any of those cuts, rotate 90 degrees, and cut across to make a cube.
Make a large brunoise when you want to hold onto more texture, like in stews or braises.
A medium brunoise would make a refined salsa, releasing more flavors, aromas, and natural juices.
Use a fine brunoise to unleash the most flavor into a dish, or build a robust sauce.
Rondelle
These next two cuts are some of my favorites and most used.
To make a rondelle, slice straight downward, perpendicular to the direction of the fruit or vegetable.
Paysanne
The paysanne cut is more rustic in shape.
Like the rondelle, you dont need to bother with trimming off the round sides to make squared-up edges.
This cut showcases the vegetables natural irregularities, and therein lies the beauty.
Finished paysanne slices will look like a pizza pie that was cut in half or cut into quarters.
To make a paysanne cut, slice the ingredient in half lengthwise.
(If you wanted a half-moon paysanne, you could skip the second step.)
you’re free to line up the pieces together to be more efficient with your slicing.
Turn them 90 degrees, then slice straight downward, perpendicular, across the lengthwise cuts.
you could cut them as thin as an eighth of an inch or even a quarter-inch.
