Esmé Partridge. Credit: Esmé

Tableside Dining Is Having a Moment

9 Minute read

03 Apr 2026

Caitlin White

Journalist

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From tuna carved tableside to clay-baked presentations, chefs are leaning into the theater of service, but not every moment is built to last.

In the dimly lit, golden-hued dining room of Casa Dani in Los Angeles, a server carefully trims the edges from a vivid slice of tuna carpaccio glistening in Spanish olive oil. From the section of the menu dubbed “tuna, as served in Andalucía,” the porterhouse cut features three grades of fish, akami, chu-toro, and o-toro, each separated tableside, then twirled into bite-sized portions and arranged by quality.

If the plate had arrived finished, it would have been just another crudo-style dish among the many raw fish starters on restaurant menus. Instead, the tableside moment doubles as a culinary lesson spanning butchery, seafood quality, and the nuances of Spanish fishing culture. The process is both visually compelling and instructive, making it well suited for social media, where diners increasingly document and share these moments.

In the age of Instagram and TikTok, when a viral video can rival a rave review or a MICHELIN star, tableside dishes carry new weight. For many chefs, however, the appeal extends beyond spectacle. At Casa Dani, the tuna reflects a central ingredient in Chef Dani García’s personal story and embodies the quiet luxury of exceptional sourcing. The kitchen considers it a personal dish, making its tableside presentation a natural extension of that narrative.

“On the surface, it’s a restrained, minimal dish, but that’s exactly where the luxury comes from,” says Chef Luis Mayoral, Head of Culinary at sbe, the hospitality company partnered with the restaurant. “Finishing it tableside allows us to highlight the quality of the tuna and share why something so simple can also feel so special. It’s not about adding more, it’s about honoring what’s already there.”

The novelty of a tableside presentation can make an immediate impression, but the practice can wear thin if overused. It requires diners to pause conversation and can feel cumbersome when done purely for spectacle. “Tableside dining is a mixture of art and science,” says Brendan Scott, executive chef at Golden Steer Steakhouse in New York. “If too many dishes are tableside then the ritual loses its specialness. Diners can tire quickly and it becomes blasé, or even worse, a nuisance.”

One of the most classic tableside dishes, the Caesar salad, is a staple at Golden Steer Steakhouse, where Scott says the restaurant serves about 3,000 salads a month at its Las Vegas location. The dish works as a spectacle for a couple of reasons. Because it was originally improvised tableside in the 1920s, it remains a natural fit for an old-school steakhouse like Golden Steer. And as simple as it may be, diners at destination restaurants in cities like New York and Las Vegas often expect a sense of occasion.

Another essential part of a successful tableside dish is minimizing the potential for mistakes. “Dishes done tableside must be sturdy to minimize room for error,” Scott says. “For example, our Caesar salad uses two emulsifiers, eggs and mustard, making it difficult for the sauce to break.” A viral post of the restaurant’s tableside Caesar from last year highlights how one server has made more than 375,000 salads, underscoring the role of staff expertise.

The Fine Line Between Theater and Distraction

Beyond technique, balancing “phone eats first” dining culture with a chef’s vision can be a challenge. “When you’re bringing the theater of the kitchen into the dining room, people get excited about it,” says Chef Danny Grant, who helms Maple & Ash, with locations in Chicago and Miami. “We identify tableside moments by thinking about what dishes some people might steer away from. I use it as a way to get people excited to try something new, or to look at something that’s a little more unique.”

One of Maple & Ash’s most popular tableside preparations, the fire-roasted seafood tower pasta back, builds directly on the restaurant’s signature seafood tower. The dish arrives hot, with shellfish drenched in garlicky butter and chili oil, leaving behind rich juices in the pan. Those drippings become the foundation for a pasta toss, where house-made pasta is added directly to the pan and finished tableside. The preparation grew out of a simple realization during staff meals, when Grant began using the leftover butter and seafood juices to create a second, equally indulgent dish.

Adding fresh-made pasta, olive oil, chopped parsley, and a squeeze of lemon transforms those drippings into a second dish built from the original. “It’s not on the menu, but it’s verbally sold to pretty much everyone who gets the tower,” he says. “It’s a perfect way to capture all those juices and flavors from the seafood tower, with the pasta finished right in front of you. That, for me, is a perfect evolution of tableside service. It’s not so cumbersome that it takes over the entire table for ten minutes. It’s engaging, it’s quick, and it’s a surprise moment from a dish they already had on their table.”

Turning Dinner Into a Moment

The element of surprise is a key factor in creating a tableside dish that delivers rather than drags. At Esmé in Chicago, owner and chef Jenner Tomaska leans into that approach with a clay-baked presentation. For this preparation, the ingredients are baked inside clay sculpted to resemble the dish itself. “Most recently, [we had] a partridge stuffed with a foie gras sausage, wrapped in cabbage leaves, then fully encased in clay and hand-sculpted to resemble a bird,” he explains. “The dish is baked to order from raw inside the clay, wheeled out on a guéridon, and cracked open tableside with a hammer.”

After the clay is broken, the aromas of the bird fill the air as the meat is carved, sauced, and served. Tomaska calls it “a moment of discovery rather than just a plate of food.” In the kitchen, blind-baking inside clay without visual cues requires rigorous R&D to dial in timing, temperature, and the effects of the clay. For Tomaska, the reaction from guests is more than worth the effort. “The moment consistently creates surprise and excitement, and guests genuinely love the theater and sense of discovery,” he says.

As dining culture becomes increasingly shaped by video, the balance between creating excitement and maintaining substance is more important than ever. Grant sees it as a matter of intent and identity that starts with the chef. “Showmanship is a big part of why people even go out to dinner,” he says. “But when you start running an entire restaurant based on Instagram content, that’s when it derails from being anything authentic. Celebratory moments in the dining room should be captured and shared, but I want it to be just a piece of the story, not the entire identity of the restaurant.”