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Commercial food dishes go into the oven, come out, and go onto the table or the buffet line without the food being transferred, which saves a step and keeps the dish looking the way the kitchen plated it. We stock gratin dishes, pie dishes and serving dishes, in ceramic and porcelain, cast iron and stainless. Delivered anywhere in Australia.
Ceramic oven to table dishes look the best and break the most easily. Stainless is the toughest and the plainest. Cast iron is what to use when the food has to stay hot. They sit in the commercial cookware range with commercial casserole pans and commercial roasting pans, and the presentation side is under crockery and tableware.
Weighing ceramic against stainless before you commit to a set? The price guide lists the dishes by material and size so you can settle the mix first.
These are the top FAQs for Commercial Food Dishes
Food dish or roasting pan?
Depth and intent. A roasting pan is deep, metal and built for volume in the oven; a food dish is shallower, usually smaller, and built to be seen.
Use the pan for the batch and the dish for the portion.
Can I put a cold ceramic dish in a hot oven?
As a rule, no. Thermal shock cracks ceramic, and a cold dish into a hot oven is the classic way to lose one. Let it come up, or start it in a cooler oven.
This is the main reason ceramic dishes break in commercial kitchens. Check the stated thermal shock rating on the product page if the service model requires it.
Which dishes suit a buffet line?
Stainless, almost always, because it takes the heat of a bain marie or a chafer indefinitely and will not crack when it is knocked. A standard pan footprint means it drops straight into the line.
If the look of ceramic is wanted on a buffet, use it on the cold section. See chafing dish sets and fuel for the hot end.
How do I portion out of the same dish I baked in?
By sizing the dish to the portion count. A gratin cut from a dish that is too big leaves an untidy remainder; one baked in individual dishes always looks right but takes far more oven space and washing.
Most kitchens run both: individual dishes for à la carte, a large dish for functions and set menus.
What goes under them on the table?
A board, a trivet or a base, because an oven dish will mark a table and burn a hand. This is the part that gets forgotten when the dishes are ordered.
A slate or wooden serving board does the job and looks deliberate. A folded cloth does not.
Are they machine washable?
Stainless, yes. Porcelain and most commercial ceramic, generally yes, though baked-on cheese and sugar need soaking first because a machine cycle will not shift them.
Cast iron dishes are hand wash. Check each product page, and keep a soaking sink or a long-handled brush at the pot wash rather than scouring glazed surfaces.
How many should I hold?
Enough for the busiest service plus the number that will be in the wash during it. Dishes that are both cooked in and served from turn over twice as fast as plates, so the count is higher than it looks.
Add a breakage allowance for anything ceramic, and keep the sizes down to two or three so the shelving and the modular shelving they live on stays workable.
