Nonculinary

Nonculinary is an adjective used to describe things that are not related to cooking or food preparation. It is used to distinguish non-culinary from culinary contexts in writing, catalogs, and classifications, and it can occasionally function as a noun to refer to non-culinary things or people.

The term is formed by adding the prefix non- to culinary, which derives from the French culinaire, from Latin culina meaning kitchen.

In practice, nonculinary is common in labeling and discussions of interdisciplinary fields. Examples include nonculinary herbs used for medicinal or ornamental purposes, nonculinary equipment not used in cooking, and nonculinary staff such as administrators or cleaners in a kitchen. In education and research, curricula may separate culinary instruction from nonculinary modules such as nutrition science, food safety, or restaurant management.

See also culinary, gastronomy, food science, kitchen management.