The Formal Dinner by Louis Sherry

The formal dinner setting for the first course of Oysters, by famed gilded age restauranteur and hotelier, Louis Sherry.
Oftentimes, hoteliers and restauranteurs get some aspects of the table setting wrong. It could be a matter of personal or establishment preference or possibly wanting to start a trend. — “At the left of the service plate are three forks — prongs up and perfectly aligned. Nearest the plate is the salad fork…”
Note that he has only one glass or goblet at the setting, he placed the napkin on the left and refers to the fork tines as “prongs.” These were unique choices in an age of definitive social rules.

 

THE one occasion of the day, perhaps, when we do not stiffen perceptibly at the idea of formality— when we do not mind a slight tightening of the bonds of acceptedly good procedure. Here the candle-sticks which all through the day have been frowned upon, come into their own-great high ones, for they are with- out shades and must be above the eye level. The question of bread and butter plates is an open one, but they are convenient. I like them and I use them.

The cloth is of white damask over a “felt.” The decorations are flowers, in a flower bowl of silver. Dinner napkins are either folded square and flat and laid on each place plate or they may be loosely folded and placed at the right of the oyster fork. Silver place plates are extremely desirable and are not removed until the soup course has been finished — the oyster and soup plates being placed on top of them.

At the left of the service plate are three forks — prongs up and perfectly aligned. Nearest the plate is the salad fork. Next to this comes the dinner fork, while the fish fork takes its place at the extreme left. At the right and nearest to the plate is the Mirrorstele-blade dinner knife— next the silver fish knife, both with edges turned toward the plate the soup spoon and last the oyster fork.

At a formal dinner no place is left uncovered by a plate at any time. The only dishes placed on the table are the small, decorative silver holders of sweets and nuts. The carving is done in the kitchen. — From “Silverware: The Autocrat of Every Table,” 1926

 🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Gilded Age Dining Requisites

The Gilded Age table often required numerous utensils for dining and serving. A souvenir spoon from Baltimore, featuring a turtle, or terrapin, is on the far left of this assortment – The fancy for collecting “souvenir”spoons, one at a time, suggests a way to secure a valuable lot of spoons with out feeling the burden of the expense. Yet, on the other hand, these spoons are much more expensive than equally good plain silver, the extra price being paid for the “idea;” but the expenditure is worth while to those who value historical associations.

China, Glassware, Cutlery, Silverware, etc... 

Chinaware for the dinner service should be of good quality. Fashions in china decoration are not fixed; the fancy of the hour is constantly changing, but a matched set is eminently proper for the dinner table, leaving the “harlequin” china for luncheons and teas. In the latter style, the aim is to have no two pieces alike in decoration, or at least, to permit an unlimited variety; a fashion that is very convenient when large quantities of dishes are liable to be needed. But for a dinner served in orderly sequence, the orderly correspondence of a handsome “set” seems more in keeping. But even with this, the harlequin idea may come in with the dessert; fruit plates, ice-cream sets, after-dinner coffees, etc., may display any number of fantasies in shape and coloring.

Artistic glassware is a very handsome feature of table furnishing. Carafes and goblets for water are always needed at dinner; wine glasses, possibly; and the serving of fruits and bon-bons gives opportunity to display the most brilliant cut-glass, or its comparatively inexpensive substitutes, which are scarcely less pretty in effect. Fine glass is infinitely more elegant than common plated-ware, and though more liable to breakage is less trouble to keep in order. The best dinner-knife is of steel, of good quality, with handle of ivory, ebony, or silver. Silver plated knives are much used; they do not discolor so readily as steel, and are easily kept polished. They answer the purpose for luncheon, but they rarely have edge enough to be really serviceable at dinner or breakfast.

Many people who own solid silverware store it away in bank vaults and use its facsimile in quadruple plate, and thus escape the constant dread of a possible burglar. For the sense of security that it gives, one may value the finest quality of plated ware, but it should be inconspicuous in style and not too profuse in quantity, since its utility, rather than its commercial value, should be suggested. Any ostentation in the use of plated ware is vulgar. But one may take a pride and satisfaction in the possession of solid silver. Every ambitious housekeeper will devise ways of securing, little by little, if not all at once, a neat collection of solid spoons and forks.

The simplest table takes on dignity when graced with these “sterling” accompaniments. The fancy for collecting “souvenir”spoons, one at a time, suggests a way to secure a valuable lot of spoons with out feeling the burden of the expense. Yet, on the other hand, these spoons are much more expensive than equally good plain silver, the extra price being paid other hand, these spoons are much more expensive than equally good plain silver, the extra price being paid for the “idea;” but the expenditure is worth while to those who value historical associations. One may find in the silver-basket salient reminders of all important epochs in our national life, a sort of primer of United States history, to say nothing of the innumerable “souvenirs” of Europe. Its subtle testimony to the intelligent taste of its owner gives the " souvenir collection its chief “touch of elegance.”

The towering “castor,” once the central glory of the dinner table, is out of style. The condiments are left on the sideboard, and handed from there in case any dish requires them, the supposition being that, as a rule, the several dishes are properly seasoned before they are served. Individual salt-cellars are placed on the table, and may be accompanied with salt spoons; if these are omitted, it is understood that the salt-cellar is emptied and refilled each time that it is used. On the family dinner-table the condiment line is not so severely drawn; vinegar in cut glass cruets, mustard in Satsuma pots, and individual “peppers”— in silver, china, or glass, and of quaint designs are convenient and allowable.

A table covered with white damask, overlaid with sparkling china and cut-glass, and reflecting the white light of polished silver, is a pretty but lifeless sight. Add one magic touch— the centre-piece of flowers and the crystallized beauty — wakes to organic life. In arranging the modern dinner-table, when the service is to be à la Russe, floral decorations are almost indispensable. Without something attractive for the eye to rest upon, the desert stretch of linen looks like the white ghost of famine mocking the feast.

The shape of the table, the available space, and the nature of the occasion decide the quantity and distribution of the flowers. It is a matter in which wide latitude is given to individual taste and ingenuity, original designs and odd conceits being always in order, subject only to the law of appropriateness.

For a square or extra wide table a large centre piece, either round or oblong, is usually chosen, with endless varieties in its component arrangement. It may be low and flat, like a floral mat, in the middle of the table, or it may be a lofty epergne, or an interlacing of delicate vine-wreathed arches, or a single basket of feathery maidenhair fern-—in fact, anything that is pretty and which the inspiration of the moment may suggest. —Agnes H. Morton, 1899

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Gilded Age Etiquette of Stemware Placement

Diagram illustrating how to arrange glasses in a formal table setting from Fanny Gillette, The White House Cook Book: A Selection of Choice Recipes Original and Selected (Chicago: R. S. Peale and Co., 1887), 467, Special Collections, Michigan State University Libraries. — Etiquipedia fails to see how this setting would not simply invite stemware numbered I, II and III to fall to the floor, as the plate is properly placed an inch from the table’s edge. It’s the most confusing diagram we have ever seen for stemware.

Besides the cost of the food itself, another major obstacle to hosting a formal dinner in the Gilded Age was the number of use-specific dishes and utensils thought to be necessary. Wealthy households in this era had mammoth holdings of dishes, cutlery, and glassware. 

Fanny Gillette’s Diagram Illustrating How to Arrange Glasses on the Table at Each Setting

A –  PLATE
I  –   Glass for Sauterne
II –   Glass for Sherry
III–  Glass for Rhine Wine
IV –  Glass for Water
V –   Glass for Champagne
VI –  Glass for Burgundy

Note: Etiquipedia fails to see how this setting would not simply invite stemware numbered I, II and III to fall to the floor, as the plate is properly placed an inch from the table’s edge. It’s the most confusing diagram we have ever seen for stemware. We do often marvel at how graphic artists of that period often get their subjects incorrect when it came to the drawings for patents. It’s possible the artist misunderstood the written directions and the artwork was never checked. We’ll probably never know, however, we do not recommend this as proper placement.

 

— From “Food in the American Gilded Age,” Edited by Helen Zoe Veit

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia