Etiquette of Sporks

A silver ice cream fork used with a ramekin dish and matching under plate. Ice cream forks are in the spoon-fork combo family. They are also known as “sporks.” Other similar combination antiques were for eating terrapin and eating from ramekins.

“Ice cream forks are not the only table implements that combine a bowl with prongs. You could pass these off as terrapin forks.

What’s that? Your guests don’t want to eat a gelatinous mass embedded with turtle parts? Miss Manners will try again.

They could be used as ramekin forks. And you don’t even have to catch a ramekin. That can consist of anything baked into an individual dish, such as eggs with breadcrumbs, cheese, bits of meat, whatever you choose. A souffle, if you wish. Or you could enjoy your ice cream, and set out in pursuit of specialized terrapin and ramekin forks. Miss Manners would understand.” – Judith Martin, aka Miss Manners, on ramekin forks and other ‘sporks’ in 2013

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

Etiquette of 19th - Early 20th C. Dining

An informal table set with a service plate, an under plate, a ramekin dish in a silver holder with handle, holding the first course for the meal, for each diner at the table. Victorian meals by 1900, were so elaborate, that books were written to explain how to serve the food. Setting the table might have required as many as seven sterling silver forks for all of the various dishes that were to be served. By the 1920s though, casual dining ushered in Fiesta ware, which continues to be popular with collectors today.

   

     How Dishes Have Changed 

Table manners, just like clothes, have become less formal and less complicated in the past 50 years. A set of dishes today will have about six pieces for a place setting, and a set of tableware (often made of stainless steel, which doesn’t need to be cleaned like silver) will have six or seven pieces to a place setting.

The Victorian dinner table seemed to be filled with hundreds of styles of silverware and dishes. Etiquette demanded the correct utensils for each type of food. A set of silver could have more than 100 pieces. There could be a special fork for oysters, salad, dinner, lunch, dessert, cake, pie and cold meat, and all sorts of serving forks.

Even dishes had special uses. How many people today use a ramekin (a small, straight-sided dish used for custards), a cream soup dish (shaped like a small bowl with two handles), a teacup, coffee cup, demitasse cup, after-dinner cup and many other dishes? Collectors can rarely identify a mush-and-milk set, herring dish, asparagus bowl, berry set or even a shredded-wheat dish. Each was made in a special shape but with the same pattern. Modern examples are not even made. — By Ralph and Terry Kovel in the Times, 1999

Old advertisement for a berry set. These pressed glass sets make entertaining a bit more special and can be found in antique shops or online.

— Photos from Etiquipedia’s private library

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