Julienne

(Credit: Creative Commons licensed via Pebble Soup)

This is food preparation technique that cuts food into very thin slices – kind of like shoestring potatoes, or very thin french fries.

I couldn’t find any consensus on etymology. Some resources says it was likely named for a chef who pioneered or championed it.

I did find one specific claim:

It is named after a French 18th-century military hero, Julien de Saint-Julien, who reportedly enjoyed his vegetables cut in this precise manner for a more elegant presentation on his table.

But this was unsourced, and I didn’t find this repeated anywhere else.

Why I Looked It Up

I had heard the term for years, but couldn’t figure out why it had an odd name, whereas most all other cutting techniques have more straightforward names.