Bad Table Manners Are a Give-Away

Gretchen whacks and stabs at roast, potatoes and vegetables, reducing all to mince-meat before she eats. She brandishes elbows in mid-air, holds her fork awkwardly, and spreads her napkin like a blanket on her lap.

                                                

Gretchen thinks she's passing herself off as a person of culture. But her table manners are a dead give-away. She whacks and stabs at roast, potatoes and vegetables, reducing all to mince-meat before she eats. She brandishes elbows in mid-air, holds her fork awkwardly, and spreads her napkin like a blanket on her lap.

Well-bred diners cut off only one piece at a time and keep elbows lowered inconspicuously while cutting. They hold the fork easily with forefinger extended along the handle. And they lay the napkin across the lap in a double or triple-fold unless it's a tea napkin. Learn little points of etiquette that make you welcome at smart places. – Santa Ana Journal, 1936

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

Table Setting — The Linen

In the colored damasks every woman will find an opportunity to vary her table setting effects occasionally with a harmonious combination of pastel shades in tablecloth, glass, china and centerpiece. But the conservative woman still uses white damask for her formal dinners, and undoubtedly will continue to do so.

White linen damask is the classic covering for the dinner-table. Linen and lace are often combined and sometimes elaborate all lace tablecloths are used. When a lace cloth is used, it is placed on a bare table.

In the colored damasks every woman will find an opportunity to vary her table setting effects occasionally with a harmonious combination of pastel shades in tablecloth, glass, china and centerpiece. But the conservative woman still uses white damask for her formal dinners, and undoubtedly will continue to do so.

Tablecloths

Before you buy your tablecloths, carefully measure your tableand allow a twelve-to-fifteen-inch overhang for your dinner cloths, and an eight-to-twelve-inch overhang for your luncheon cloths.

Tablecloths should be French hemmed, with the hem three-eighths of an inch to one-half an inch wide, and napkins, also French hemmed, have hems of from one-eighth of an inch to one-quarter of an inch wide.

A white linen damask cloth is as appropriate for the formal or informal luncheon as for the formal or informal dinner. Gay colored sets of damask or of less formal materials are often used. Linen runners, with small luncheon napkins to matchare popular, especially on long tables like refectory tablesAn especially beautiful table is sometimes left bare except for the mats under the centerpiece, plates, and glasses. Damask napkins are used with these.

Luncheon sets are appropriate for use at breakfast, luncheon, an informal dinner, or supper.

For the tea table one may use an embroidered or hemstitched teacloth, or a simple or elaborate lace cover, or a combination of linen and lace.

Napkins

Tablecloths and napkins should match. For formal dinners an unusually large napkin is smart, but nowadays napkins, like most other “furnishings,” have shrunk, and one rarely encounters dinner napkins larger than twenty-eight inches and usually not larger than twenty-four inches.

Luncheon napkins are from thirteen inches to eighteen inches square. White hemstitched luncheon napkins are often used with a white linen damask cloth.

Breakfast napkins, often colored or with a colored border to match the cloth, are usually a bit smaller than luncheon napkins but may be the same size.

Appropriate to the appointments of the tea table are the small tea napkins, sometimes of fine handkerchief linen with scalloped edges, sometimes of damask with hemstitched borders, and sometimes of heavy linen with drawnwork borders. In houses with Early American furnishings —and with excellent laundry technic— the old-fashioned damask napkins with fringe edges add a charmingly quaint touch. But with uncertain laundering these are very apt to be unattractive looking. — “The American Woman’s Cookbook,” 1951

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

Good Manners Keeps Friends

Pull yourself together, Sue! Charlie’s only removing an olive pit from his mouth.

Bad Table Etiquette Offends New Friends

Pull yourself together, Sue! Charlie’s only removing an olive pit from his mouth!

He thinks he’s especially polite, poor boy, to use that big dinner napkin as a barricade. But etiquette says, simply cover your mouth with a cupped hand and inconspicuously drop an olive pit, a fish bone or a fruit stone into it.

Don't let old-fashioned table superstitions ruin dinner dates for you. Remember unobtrusive manners are smartest. 

And take these tips:

• Table manners can make or break you socially.
• Never unfold your napkin entirely, unless it’s tea size. 
• When you use your napkin, lift only a corner to your mouth.
• If you’re dancing between courses, drop your napkin on your chair– not on the table.
• At a properly set table, begin with the silver farthest from your plate and continue in the order in which the pieces are placed.

— From the Santa Ana Journal, November 1937

 

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

New England New Year’s Traditions

Illustration from The Butt’ry Shelf Cookbook by Tasha Tudor

A New Year's Day Open House

“Rabbits” is the first word to be said on the first day every month. It's an old family custom, reputedly bringing money to anyone who doesn't forget to say it. The fact that it is sometimes hard to see that the promise comes true doesn't alter our fun in saying it. First to awaken, echoing through the house, begins the New Year with the magic word.

Nearly always a cold, cold day, sometimes quite a stormy one, this day in New England—and indeed the country over-is for family and friends of all sizes and ages. The old house is filled to bursting in spite of weather. Boots are stacked high in the front hall, the big four-poster bed in the company room is loaded with coats and caps and mittens. In the Old Kitchen, hot spiced cider is ready for passing in mugs as a good warm-up. This is a welcoming room with its huge fireplace, beehive oven, and black ened ceiling beams.

In the best parlor, the candles have been lighted and the hearth-fire, too. Hot tea and coffee steam in gleaming silver pots reflecting the candlelight. Beside the teapot are a pitcher of cream, a dish of lemon slices with clove, and one of candied mint leaves. On the coffee tray are a bowl of whipped cream and a silver nutmeg grater. Thin Staffordshire cups of green sprig pattern or pink luster, coin-silver teaspoons, and hand-hemstitched tea napkins are arranged on polished mahogany.

The Christmas Cooky Tree is loaded with the last and the best of the butt'ry holiday supply, now dwindled to these saved especially for this party. The traditional family Pound Cake is served on the best Sandwich glass cake plate. A silver bread tray is brought to table, its neat rows of oh-so-thinly sliced Rich Plum Cake fragrant and glistening with “special flavoring.” Grandfather's eggnog on the serving tables invites a toast to the New Year.

In the Old Kitchen, the children enjoy gingerbread animal cookies, and another mug of cider. Thin sandwiches disappear like magic. Have a look at the golden shining Christmas tree, and now “Happy New Year” is being called out everywhere until the last guest has gone. Candles have burned down and the last dish is washed. Back on the top shelf of the butt'ry go the Canton punch and silver eggnog bowls, and upstairs for us all, warmed by friendship and the fun of the New Year's first party.

New Year’s Day Open House Menu

Eggnog                   Hot Spiced Cider

Christmas Cookies            Christmas Candies

Pound Cake                  Rich Plum Cake

Date-Nut Bread Sandwiches 

Gingerbread Animal Cookies

Tea        Candied Mint Leaves      Coffee

From The Butt’ry Shelf Cookbook, by Mary Mason Campbell, 1968 

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