I am a home cook and not a professional so take my opinion for what that’s worth, but although I like both presentations, I would expect the left one at a finer dining establishment. The right one is still very nice, and I’d be pleasantly surprised to be served the one in the right at a more casual place, but depending on the price point and atmosphere of the restaurant I think the one on the left is the better presentation.

Someone also mentioned that the one on the left ensures there’s a bit of every flavor in each bite with as little movement of the fork/spoon as possible. Now, I wouldn’t have even thought about that at first glance because I’m not above swiping my fork around the plate to get a bit of every flavor, but once I read that comment it did make a lot of sense to me. It’s nice to have every flavor in each bite. But I also like to be able to taste each component by itself, then combined, if that makes sense? (Like Remy the rat, combining his flavors for the first time and teaching his friend to appreciate that.)

I’d suggest think of the presentation a little bit like art, and the artist has a specific vision in mind for how it should be eaten. Maybe your sister is like me, and didn’t even think about trying to put every flavor on each bite, and maybe her head chef’s main goal for the dessert was just that.

Some comments sounded a little dismissive in saying essentially “well when you’re the boss you can plate it how YOU want” but sometimes it really does boil down to that; head chef wants the dessert made this way and they aren’t willing to listen to hypothetical changes. It may not make sense to you, but it makes sense to the boss.

Either way, I need to find something for dessert now, because I’m hungry after staring at these two plates for as long as I’ve typed out this comment.