We were watching Masterchef USA and they were consistently calling the main course the entrée. I’ve searched online and can’t find a reason, other than the main course was served with a fanfare of trumpets in the distance past making it an entrance. This seems highly improbable to me.
Damn that sucks. I grew up using it as pre main. all our family and friends tended to as well. I cant actually remember what restaraunts back home would say though.
Entrée in French is the pre-main course meal, what the British call a “starter.” Could be a salad, toasts with foie gras, some salty verrine… In the US though, it’s used commonly to describe the main course, cause it’s more classy than “main course” and less of a mouthful than “plat principal.”
The culinary sense of entrée can be traced back to 18th-century Britain. In those days a formal dinner could include not only the principal courses of soup, fish, meat, and dessert, but also an impressive array of side dishes. Between the fish and meat courses would come a small side dish, and because this secondary dish came immediately before the centerpiece of the meal, it was called the entrée, being, in effect, the entrance to the really important part of the meal. As dining habits have changed, meals have become simpler, and fewer courses are served. However, in the US, the course following the appetizer continued to be called the entrée, perhaps because it is a French word, and anything French always sounds elegant.
BRE-starter, followed by main course.
AmE- appetizer, followed by entree.
AmE seems to go for the more complex word- lift: elevator; flat: apartment; rubber (ha ha): eraser.