Also known as "hors d'oeuvres", are food items served before the Main Dishes of a meal.

Hot soups are characterized by cooking solid ingredients (meat and savory vegetables) in a liquid to extract the flavor. Cold soups can be made from uncooked ingredients. Both are very nutritious.

Salads include a wide variety of dishes: Green salads; vegetable salads; salads of pasta, legumes, or grains; mixed salads incorporating meat, poultry, or seafood; and fruit salads. Salads may include a mixture of cold and hot ingredients, and often include raw vegetables and/or fruits. Salads can be very nutritious.

A Main Dish is the featured (or primary) dish in a meal that consists of more than one course. It usually follows the Appetizer (First) course, and/or the Soup and/or Salad course.

Side Dishes are meant to accompany the Main Dish of a meal.

Cheese courses are a French tradition (in France, a cheese-less meal would be considered uncivilized). In America they make the most sense in the context of a planned, multi-course meal in which the other courses are kept to a modest size.

Sorbets are a fruit-flavored ice served as a dessert or between courses as a palate refresher. Egg whites can be added to reduce the size of the ice crystals (this turns your Sorbet into something smoother, called a Sherbet).