Five Minute Life Lessons » table setting

Try the Formal Place Setting

lifeskills — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 10:00:02 +0000

Today, let’s try using the formal place setting.

Set up a formal place setting using the plates, cups, glasses, and silverware you already have in your kitchen. Do you already have all of the pieces available? I must admit that we don’t have any fish forks, so we just used another salad fork in its place.

Once you have the place setting, design a menu that would use everything in the place setting. How many courses would you have? What would you serve?

If you want to take it one step further, pick an evening and have a formal dinner at your home. How formal would you make it?

Formal Table Setting

lifeskills — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 10:00:54 +0000

Today we are going back to our formal dinner party. After we sit down, we see the place setting below.

: Formal Table Setting

For the formal table setting, there are some more pieces, but the general setting remains the same. We still have the dinner plate in the center, the forks on the left, the knife and spoons on the right, and the glass to the right of the plate.

To the forks on the left, we have added a fish fork and a salad fork. We have also added a soup spoon on the right. During the different courses of the meal, you will generally use the silverware in order from the outside (furthest away from the plate) to the inside (nearest the plate).

To the left and a bit above the plate is the salad plate. The butter plate is near that. Use the butter plate for bread and rolls. If butter is offered, take a small slice and put it on your butter plate, not directly on the roll. Then take the butter from the plate to butter your roll.

Above the plate you will see a few more pieces of silverware. These are generally used for appetizers or dessert.

The cup and saucer for coffee or tea complete this formal place setting.

If you have ever been in a restaurant and wondered which plate to use for your roll and which water glass is yours, remember that the water glass on the right is yours. Since the majority of people are right handed, having the water glass on the right makes it easier to pick up for most people. Use the plate on your left for your roll.

Informal Table Settings

lifeskills — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 10:00:15 +0000

We are going to leave our dinner party for today as we look at table settings. Today we are going to look at informal table settings – the kind of table settings you would use at home every evening.

: Informal Table Setting

In the middle of the place setting is the dinner plate. On the left of the plate is the fork with a napkin under it. On the right of the plate, we have the knife facing the plate with the spoon on the outside. On the right side above the plate is the glass.

At my house, we don’t need all of the silverware at every meal. We just put out what we need.But we can still put them in their proper places.