Each course is a minipuzzle indicating a single letter:

Hors d'oeuvres

• 1 Mediterranean dish
• 1 Caribbean dish
• 1 Arabian dish

These are all seas, indicating the letter C.

Soup

Every other soup < a good pork chop soup, fresh from the pen

This clues the pigpen cipher, where "<" represents the letter U.

Appetizer

• Jasmine flowers
• Fresh lemongrass
• Herbs to match a floral taste
• A classic English breakfast

These are all kinds of tea, indicating the letter T.

Salad

A salad is only as good as the sum of its parts.

• 1 pound lettuce, torn into bite-size pieces
• 1 cup mayonnaise
• ¼ cup olive oil
• 2 tbsp lemon juice
• 2 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1 garlic clove, grated
• 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• 1 pinch sea salt
• ½ cup Parmesan cheese, freshly grated
• ¼ pound croutons
• 2 tbsp black pepper

As suggested, sum up its parts, yielding 12, corresponding to the letter L.

Main course

Must cook smth dairy-fr. for Narmada. Idk why sh'won't chow down on animal products. Maybs a chick'n sandwich? Pity I can't avail my stomach of any actual birds for this lunchon.

The strange style and interesting spelling is to avoid using the letter E

Dessert

Some ideas:

• Something like ice pudding?
• Um… cake?
• I could mash some mallow?

Each of these "desserts" is missing the letter R (Rice pudding, Rumcake, maRshmallow).

Mignardise

Waffle House is a questionable choice:

• don't like Orange marmalade.
• waffles can't be topped with just Any Thing.
• it's too late for an Egg Nog flavor,
• can't Even get Real Eclairs at the store these days.
• ... ?

Reading capital letters gives WH O, WH AT, WH EN, and WH ERE, leaving WH Y as the missing entry.

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Putting the letters from the minipuzzles together yields the answer CUTLERY.