MODERN TABLE MANNERS

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 166, 10 April 1926, Page 17

MODERN TABLE MANNERS

FINGERS OUT OF FASHION Knives and spoons to-day are back cumbers. Their rivals are a fork and a pair of tongs. The up-to-date diner can, in fact, now eat a full course dinner, with the exception of the soup, aided onlv by a fork and a pair of the

now popular tongs. Even when the ices come along the spoon is discarded, this delectable daintv being eaten with the aid of a special finely-pronged fork (states a writer in an English exchange) . The latest custom of providing every dinner guest with a pair of tongs m addition to the other . table cutlery* sometimes proves confusing to the uninitiated hotel visitor, who does not know how to use the tongs. Any American visitor will “put him wise,” however, for the tongs are. almost as indispensable to the American diner as the everv-handv fork. In an English hotel, however,' the tongs usually accompany a slice of lemon, and are for squeezing that fruit instead of using the fingers. Fingers, as an adjunct to eating even in the case of asparagus, are again decidedly “infra dig” in these days when piactically every dish has its own special eating implement. _ Asparagus is now once "more eaten with tongs—graceful, looking things with flat ends which grasp the juicy stalk firmly enough to allow it to be conveyed to the mouth in safety. . Caviare, on the other hand, is one ot the few dishes now eaten with a knife—bnt the knife used is a specially designed one with a blunted cf ,, G ; Oysters are eaten with a long-handled four-pronged fork. . . A popular method to-day is to bring along the necessary cutlery with each dish, and so do away with the need for an elaboratelv laid table. At one large West End hotel where this custom is largely followed, it was pointed out that the new methods of eating made this svstem of serving more practical than the old way. At one dinner lately,. when a count was taken, it was found that each guest had used 14 pieces of cutlery and three finger bowls! " . The demand for ice-cream, grapefruit and cocktails has naturallv had its influence on the modern table. 1 lie pantrv at one hotel can show over 100 differently shaped cocktail glasses everv one designed for a different kind of cocktail. In addition there arc some seventv or eighty ice servers of different patterns and designs. Ices frozen nearlv as hard as billiard balls, so that thev can easily be eaten with a fork are also beloved by_ Americans visiting this country. It is they, too, who have created the demand for mint tea, which is now leisurely sipped by fashionable women from 3 to 4 ini the afternoon. A long tumbler is half-filled with ice, the tea is poured over it, ano a sprig of mint is thrown in as a garnish and decoration.

Miss Evergreen: “You don’t think I am too old for a tiara*, do you, dear. Miss Bloom: “Oh, no; they arc even putting arclights on the pyramids