Cube, Dice, Chop and Mince

I get lots of questions about the difference between cubing, dicing, chopping and mincing.  The difference is really quite simple.  When you cube a food you want it to be bite size.  Think about the cheese cube.  It is about one inch square or more.  On a toothpick, it becomes a snack or with the addition of other bite size foods it can be an appetizer.  Dicing can be thought of as a smaller version of cubing about 1/2".  You are still trying for that square shape. For this food, let's say green peppers, you want to see it in the salad but you don't want it to be the only thing you taste.  It has to be smaller and share the "stage" with other foods in looks and not over flavor.  When we chop we really don't care so much about the shape of the food and the size is often about 1/4".  Sometimes the food will almost cook away in the recipe.  What we want is the flavor and some of the presence of the food.  A good example here is the onion.  When we chop onions for soup, we really want the flavor and being able to see some of the onion is not really a bad thing.  Mincing is the smallest cut of all and shape doesn't matter.  The best example is garlic.  We usually mince garlic into very small pieces.  Garlic can have a very robust flavor and that small minced clove really adds to any dish.

So there you have it.  The simple explaination of the difference between cubing, dicing, chopping and mincing.  See you next time.
Becky Homecy