This document discusses various methods for serving food, including plating dishes, serving from tureens or flats, standard placement of food items on plates, and serving accompanying sauces. It also covers serving larger groups, tray service, room service, and enhancements like serving from trolleys, gueridon service, and carving stations. Proper techniques are outlined for each method like holding dishes and positioning food to ensure consistent quality service.

1. Food service skills

2. Published by Hodder Education  J Cousins, D Lillicrap and S Weekes
Silver service of soup
• Soup can be served:
 pre-plated
 from a large tureen at the sideboard
 from an individual tureen.

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Service from an individual tureen
a)
b)

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Service of plated foods
• Serve from the right.
• Ensure that placement on the table is
consistent.
• Serve cold food before hot food.

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Silver service from flats
• Flats are always held on napkin on palm of hand.
• Food is always presented to the customer before
serving.
• Serving dish is held a little above the hot joint
plate with the front edge slightly overlapping the
rim of the plate.
• Portion is placed on the plate in the 6 o’clock
position.

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Silver service of potatoes and
vegetables
• Serving dishes are always held on napkin on
palm of hand.
• General rule is to serve potatoes before other
vegetables.
• A separate service spoon and fork should be
used for each different type of potato and
vegetable dish to be served.

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Silver service of potatoes and
vegetables
• Potatoes are served in
the 2 o’clock position.
• Vegetables are served
in the 10 o’clock
position.

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Standard placement of food items
Example of standard placement of food items

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Service of accompanying sauces
• Should be presented in a sauceboat on an under
plate.
• Ladleful of sauce should be lifted clear of the
sauceboat.
• Underside of the sauce ladle should then be run
over the edge of the sauceboat to prevent any
drips falling.
• Should be napped over the food or at the side
depending on the customer’s preference.

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Service for larger groups
• Larger groups can be
served:
 all together
 on a wave system,
where one table is
served at a time until
the whole room is
completed
 from a buffet. Chafing dishes used for buffets (image
courtesy of Steelite International)

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Tray service
• Main differences:
 Tray cloth replaces the tablecloth.
 Under plates are usually left out to reduce the
weight of the tray.
• When carrying:
 Bottled proprietary sauces are laid flat to avoid
accidents when carrying the tray.
 Spouts of hot beverage pots or jugs should
face inwards, to avoid spillages.

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Room service tables
a) b) c)
a) Opened
b) Laid and folded for transportation
c) Laid and opened for service, with hot cupboard fitted
(Images courtesy of Burgess Furniture Ltd, London, UK)

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Lounge and bar service
• Service of food in lounges and bar is similar
to serving in a restaurant.
• Key differences include:
 need to lay a cover each time an order is
taken
 higher volume of people (customers and
staff) moving within the area.

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Food and beverage displays
• May be left at room temperature for limited
periods during service or when on display.
• These flexibilities can be used only once for
each batch of food:
 Chilled foods can only exceed 8ºC for a
maximum of four hours.
 Hot foods can only fall below 63ºC for a
maximum of two hours.

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Service enhancements
• Includes service from trolleys such as
cheese, sweet, carving or drinks trolleys
and also gueridon service.
• The trolleys are selling aids as they display
the items on offer to the customers.
• Service enhancements are sometimes
referred to as ‘restaurant theatre’.

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Enhancements are more costly
• This is because they:
 take longer than plated or silver service
 require a higher level of service skills
 use more expensive and elaborate
equipment
 require larger service areas to allow for
the movement of the trolleys.

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Serving from a trolley
• Trolleys should always be:
 pushed, not pulled
 positioned between the staff and customer for service
 attractively presented from the customer’s point of view
 well laid out from the server’s point of view (from
behind the trolley).
• Staff should talk with customers from behind the
trolley, to the side of it or standing by the
customer’s table – not in front of the trolley.

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Cheese trolley
Image courtesy of Steelite International

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Gueridon service
• Allows an enhanced form of table service.
• Usually indicates serving foods onto the
customers’ plates at a gueridon (movable service
table, or trolley).
• Also used to refer to other enhanced service
techniques such as service using a drinks trolley,
carving trolley, cheese trolley or a sweet trolley.

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Gueridon lay-up
Example of a basic gueridon lay-up

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Further enhancements
• Further enhancements, beyond basic
gueridon service, include:
 preparing and serving foods in the service area
such as salads and dressings
 carving, jointing or filleting foods in a service
area
 flambage (the preparation and finishing, or
cooking, of foods in the restaurant, which are
also flambéed).

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Carving trolley
Image courtesy of Euroservice UK