Basic Rules For Table Setting

BASIC RULES FOR TABLE SETTING AND SERVING

1. Napkin
2. Salad fork
3. Dinner fork
4. Dessert fork
5. Bread-and-butter plate, with spreader
6. Dinner plate
7. Dinner knife.
8. Teaspoon
9. Teaspoon
10. Soup spoon
11. Cocktail fork
12. Water glass
13. Red-wine glass
14. White-wine glass
15. Coffee cup and saucer*
Basic rules are created as a guide, and not necessarily followed rigidly. In setting any table, the aims should include ease of serving the food, convenience of flatware arrangement for eating purposes, a centerpiece and a well balanced table. With the proper atmosphere established at the table, eating becomes an enjoyable experience and not a mere task that must be done three times a day. Food that is haphazardly thrown on unmatched plates on a cluttered table certainly does not appeal to the eye.

The decoration need not be elaborate. A simple centerpiece, a dish of fruit, a few flowers, or a figurine or two. A few fresh flowers, for example, when placed on a breakfast table, will not only make the food taste better, but make the entire morning seem brighter.
1. For formal dinners: Use all-over cloth of white damask or lace. For informal dinners and luncheons: Lace or linen mats or Runners. For breakfast: Gay, colorful mats of cloths.
2. Place napkins folded in squares or rectangles, at the left of the forks, open corner nearest to the plate. If no food is on the plates when the guests are seated, the napkin (folded) may be laid on the empty plate.
3. Place silver 1-inch from edge of table in straight line. Place no more than 3 pieces of silver on each side of plate.
4. Place all forks, except cocktail fork, at left of plate with prongs up. Cocktail fork is placed on plate or at extreme right. Knives and spoons at right of plate.
5. Flat silver should be arranged at each place in the order of its use for the various