The History Of Garde Manger

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The History of Garde Manger The garde manger profession began with the need to preserve food. With that said, it could be deduced that the practice of food preservation is very much older than the term garde manger. “In medieval times, manors and castles were equipped with underground larders, or cold food storage rooms. On French estates, the larder was called the garde manger” (Sackett 4). Thus, one meaning of the culinary term garde manger can be ‘a person in charge of cold foods preparation and preservation.’ Today, in industry, I have been taught that the garde manger is now referred to as the “pantry chef.” Garde manger can also be described as the place in which cold foods are prepared and stored, and the craft or profession of cold foods preparation. Garde Manger was being used long before it was a term commonly used. Perishable foods such as meat and fish were dried in the sun or packed with salt to preserve them. The first dependable method of preserving foods was drying, though. Smoking foods was derived from placing the meat on poles over a smoky fire to prevent insects and animals from feeding while it was curing. Farm families began using spices along with the salt, and discovered that tough meats can be tenderized. In the middle ages and the early renaissance, the foods that were prepared for the aristocracy were overly elaborate and heavily spiced. La Varenne, a French chef that broke with the Italian influenced medieval tradition, stressed the importance of natural flavors and lighter sauce. Salads and vinaigrettes took the place of heavier cooked foods and became the standard accompaniment to roasted meats. It was in this period that the role of garde manger expanded from food preservation to the preparation of all cold foods for the table, moving them out of the basement and into the kitchen (Sackett 4). By the end of the twentieth

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