Gilded Age Wedding Gift Etiquette

Array of Gilded Age combination salt cellars and napkin holders, patented in 1877. A set of any of these designs would make a lovely wedding gift for the bride and groom who enjoy entertaining. A salt cellar and napkin, after all, would be the required etiquette for each place setting at a dinner party or luncheon.

A good rule is to send a wedding present a couple of weeks at least before the wedding, as gifts sent early are sure of being much more appreciated than those that come from all quarters at the last moment. By observing this rule the sender will not hear “the salt cellars you so kindly sent were charming"- the third set already received.”

The package should be addressed to the bride if you are intimate with both the prospective bride and groom: and to the bride's house, addressed to the bridegroom if it is he with whom you are best acquainted.

The future circumstances of the recipients should govern the choice of gifts, and if they will not be particularly well off it is only kind to select some useful present instead of something artistic and pretty but of no use to them. – The Social Mirror, 1899

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

Table Salt Etiquette

Most hosts and hostesses will expect the salting of eggs at the table, as eggs are often times brought to the table in the shell. As Etiquipedia’s dear grandmother used to advise, eggs should never be salted by the cook or chef. It is too easy to over-salt eggs and impossible to remove salt once it’s put in. – This antique silver egg set features an adorable chick perched on a ringed dish for eggs, an egg-shaped salt cellar, a pepper shaker and a holder in the shape of a cracked egg half.

                   Quick Tips Table Salt Etiquette

🧂Salt can be placed on the dining table in shakers, grinders or very small dishes known as dips or “cellars.”

🧂If it is a large dinner party and there are not enough small salts and peppers for each place setting, there should be a set between every two place settings.

🧂If there is no small spoon accompanying a salt dip or cellar, one can use the tip of a clean knife blade to salt their food.

🧂 Salting food in a restaurant is not considered an insult if you are accustomed to a certain dish there, however, to do so without at least taking a small taste prior to adding anything to alter the flavor, may signal an unsophisticated or diminished palate. 

🧂 Unless one is being served eggs in the shell or something similar, salting something immediately in a private home is highly discouraged if one wishes to appear well-mannered. Any other food or dish should be tasted first. And do thank the cook!  It is considered a “non-verbal complaint,” comparable to pouring catsup or some other condiment all over one’s dish, prior to tasting. It is most impolite.

🧂Even if you are asked for your opinion, it is never polite to criticize someone’s food in their home or if they have brought it somewhere for you and others to enjoy.

🧂If you do not care for something you have been served, you should not be dishonest, but should say the most positive thing you can about it in the nicest way. For example, “This is incredibly spicy! I know several people who would really enjoy this dish! My dad, for one would love this!” Said with a smile, it would go over well.

🧂 Salt and pepper are to be considered “married,” so they should be kept together at the dining table. If you are asked to pass one or the other, pass them together.

🧂 At a formal or multi-course dinner, salt and pepper shakers should be removed from the dinner table on a tray with the rest of the food from the preceding course, before the dessert is brought in.

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

A Gilded Age Critic of New York Customs

 

A trio of antique toothpicks– “Three 18th to 19th century toothpicks, including a late-Georgian or early Regency era toothpick, that retracts back into itself― A toothpick is something that should NEVER be seen at a beautifully set table, yet worldwide, toothpicks are more commonplace on dining tables than one might believe. Culturally, they are accepted in some areas as long as one covers his or her mouth while picking the teeth. But this only leads someone to imagine what’s going on behind that hand. We’re all for good dental hygiene, but please... not at the dining table.” And may we add, not in the jewelry shop?!? – Image and text from the book, What Have We Here?: The Etiquette and Essentials of Lives Once Lived, from the Georgian Era through the Gilded Age and Beyond...
by Etiquipedia Site Editor, Maura J. Graber

Miss Palfrey Observes and Criticizes New York Customs

A friend of mine went into a well-known jeweler's shop on Union Square and asked to see some salt-cellars. The sales gentleman was using his toothpick vigorously, and asked her if she meant the kind that “you stick your knife into.” “No,” she answered, “I want the kind with which a spoon is used.” The man had the grace to appear embarrassed, and laid aside his toothpick. Those are first-class shops, and such things should never occur in them. Unfortunately, the toothpick has become, among a certain class, as much a part of the dress as the necktie, the watch or the collar and cuffs. 

Apropos of jewelers, a leading watch dealer tells me that watches for ladies are no longer made with second hands. Ladies say they have no occasion for timing races, nor for counting seconds, and they do not care for the second hand. I think the objection is in the name: a “second-hand watch” does not sound attractive. For my part, I want the second hand, for I like to see it go round.– Sacramento Daily Union, 1891

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

Etiquette for Soup

For Continental or American Dining, the spoon is dipped away from those dining, then brought to mouth level, and the soup sipped from the side of the spoon bowls. — “Hold your spoon on, or in, your hand, not under it. Do not grasp spoon or knife or fork as if you feared they might escape from you. Hold your spoon and fork in eating something, as you ought to hold your pen in writing. Do not put the spoon into your mouth, but drink from the side near the point.”

In how to serve and eat a dinner, a writer in the “Congregationalist” says of the first course at dinner; Never refuse soup, and never ask for a second helping. “He was such a fellow, now, as would ask for more soup at dinner,” was the condensed criticism passed upon some one by a famous English exquisite; and really it is more comprehensive than would appear on the surface, since one person at the table may keep all others waiting if he asked for a second dish of soup. 

If you wish for more salt, and have an individual cellar and no spoon, do not take the salt in your thumb and fingers; and do not after taking it on the end of your knife, perform upon the knife with your fork or spoon a tattoo. Shake the salt from your knife silently at all times; but do not take the trouble to shake it all over your plate of soup, as if it were solid, when one stir-about is all sufficient to season it to its remotest corner. At all times be sure to keep your fork out of your salt-cellar. 

Never crumble bread into your soup, and do not butter the bread you eat with it. Do not perform a circle all round the plate at every spoonful. Dip from the middle of the plate, and do not tip it to get the last drop. Be careful not to make the least sound with your lips in eating soup, or anything else; the clatter of knives and forks and dishes, and the sound of scraping, are not to be tolerated among refined people. 

Hold your spoon on, or in, your hand, not under it. Do not grasp spoon or knife or fork as if you feared they might escape from you. Hold your spoon and fork in eating something, as you ought to hold your pen in writing. Do not put the spoon into your mouth, but drink from the side near the point. — The Morning Union, 1888

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

Etiquette for Salt And Such

Individual salt cellars have the ability to elevate any place setting. They can take a look from “How nice...” to “How elegant!” Or, from “Drabulous to fabulous!” as a friend once enthused. And though we are not suggesting that salts and peppers are set on a table merely for decorative purposes, Etiquipedia kindly requests that you politely taste your food first, prior to adding anything like salt. Even after tasting the food, do not send a “non-verbal” complaint to the host or hostess by making a show of heavily salting and peppering your meal. As a thoughtful guest, please remember that you are not there to eat, but to dine and enjoy the company of your hosts.

– Photo of a Michael Aram salt cellar and salt spoon

Salt Etiquette, 

with a Touch of Pepper

🍴Polite guests always taste food prior to adding salt –or adding any spice or condiment– out of respect and graciousness to those who have prepared a meal, or invited one to a meal.

🍴If you are a guest, even after tasting the food, take care not make a show of salting your food. This is rude. It implies that the meal is “less than it should be.” It also could imply that you have an unsophisticated palate and are not able to taste subtle flavors in the meal. If invited to dinner in a private home, “non-verbal complaints” like salting food before tasting, or pouring catsup all over your food, is most impolite.

🍴In some countries, like Portugal, it is impolite to even ask for salt. It is considered an insult to the chef, whether you are a guest in someone’s home, or in restaurants.  If salt, pepper, other spices or condiments are not on the table, do not ask for them to be brought to you.

🍴The etiquette rule above applies in the reverse situation, as well. If one is hosting someone from another culture or country, and they prefer to have salt and pepper at the table, though it is not the norm for you, feel free to provide these items to make your guests feel more welcome. 

🍴 If invited as a guest to eat in a restaurant, or perhaps a wedding reception or birthday celebration, and someone else is paying the tab, such non-verbal complaints about the meal are impolite, as well. Remember, you are a guest!

🍴If asked to pass the salt, always pass it with the pepper, so that the two do not get separated.

🍴 Always say, "Excuse me" if you need to reach in front of someone caught up in conversation, when passing salt (or anything else) at the table.

🍴Be aware of those around you at the table. If the salt is nearest you (this also applies to butter, rolls, etc...) don't allow yourself to be so caught up or lost in your conversation, that someone has to reach in front of you to pass the requested item.

🍴 Judith Martin shakes out “The Salt and Pepper Question”

Q: In a set of identical salt and pepper shakers, should the salt be placed in the shaker with one or two holes? My friend's feeling is that the salt is used more, therefore it should go in the two-hole shaker; I feel that because it pours faster, the salt belongs in the shaker with one hole. We resolve to abide by your decision. 

A: If Miss Manners were to tell you, in a blustery way, to use salt cellars and pepper grinders, would you consider it a cop-out, as it were? Yes, of course you would. The truth is that Miss Manners didn't know that salt pours faster than pepper, and is now sitting here with little black and white specks all over her lap. Just a minute. (Brush, brush, brush.) 

All right now, the decision is that your friend's reasoning is incorrect, but her conclusion is correct. (Miss Manners used to get her arithmetic papers back with that remark.) Salt goes in the two-hole shaker, not because it is used more often, but because more of it is used. Put another way; over-peppered food tastes worse than over-salted food. – Miss Manners, Copyright (c) 1979 and United Feature Syndicate 

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

Place Cover Etiquette, 1922—Now

1920's inspired, luncheon place setting or place "cover," using mixed period flatware and glassware.

Before Anything Edible Comes to the Table

We will not waste time on directions regarding the laying of the tablecloth. Only remember that it must form a true line through the center of the table (your "silence cloth" had best be of table padding, a doubled cotton flannel or asbestos) and not hang below the table less than nine inches. 

The usual arrangement of the centerpiece in the center of the table (the table itself being immediately under the light, unless the waitress is thereby prevented from moving between the table and sideboard) with its dish of fruit or ferns or flowers (never so high as to cut off view or conversation) can be varied to suit individual taste. But the covers (the plates, glasses, napkin and silver of each individual) must always be in line, opposite each other on the opposite sides of the table.

The plate doilies indicate the covers when a bare table is laid. The service plate which each person receives stays where put unless it is replaced by a hot plate.

Napkins, Silver, China and Glass

Napkins (fold flat and square) lie at the left of the forks. The hem of the napkin, turned up, should parallel the forks and the table edge.

When dinner is served without a maid, everything yields to avoiding leaving the table. In that case put on the dessert silver (which otherwise should not be done) with the other dinner silver. 

Place all silver in its order of use, and remember that three forks are enough. If more are needed let them appear with the courses which demand them. The quietest and therefore most desirable way of putting the dessert silver on the table, is to serve it from a napkin, from the right. 

Knives should have their cutting edge toward the plate, at its right, and lie half an inch from the table edge. Spoons, bowls facing upward, lie at the right of the knife; forks at the left of the plate.    

 A typical 1925 luncheon menu.

When shell food is served (clams, oysters or mussels) the fork is placed at the right of the plate. The upper right-hand side of the bread and butter plate is the place for the butter spreader. 

In general do not arrange your cover too loosely, and see to it that the glass, china and silver for each cover sets close without the pieces touching. Glasses are placed just above the knives, a little to the right. Neither cups nor glasses should ever be filled to the brim. 

The bread and butter plate (bread and butter are, as a rule, not served with formal dinners) somewhat to the left, beyond the service plate. Between each two covers, or just in front of each, place your pepper and salt sets. The salt spoon lies across the open saltcellar.

When the table is set for some impromptu meal at which a knife will not be used, the fork takes the place of the knife at the right-hand side, and the teaspoon is laid beside the fork.

Desirable Improvements

No one wants to see the inner economy of the butler's pantry, nor should the perhaps fragrant but cloying odors of the kitchen be wafted into the dining room whenever the swingdoor of the pantry opens or closes. The screen obviates both disadvantages. 

Another improvement has been the introduction of the serving table in place of the sideboard. It now conveniently holds all the extras needed for the meal. — Lillian B. Lansdown's 1922, “How to Prepare and Serve a Meal; and Interior Decoration.”

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