Dining Rooms and Meal Service: French Service

French service was a feast for the eye. Serving dishes were arrayed on the table in a symmetrical, artistic pattern, illustrated by charts in many elite English and French cookery books. A few American editions of these works, such as The French Cook (1828) by Louis Eustache Ude, include table charts, but most of the pictorial guidance came from imported sources. Diners did not enter the room until the first course of dishes was laid so that a gleaming, aromatic, and copiously decked table greeted the guests. Dishes were often covered by silver domes that sparkled in the candlelight or were placed over elegant hot water baths to keep the dishes warm. Once seated, diners selected their preferred viands (it was considered greedy to sample everything) and used their single fork, knife, and spoon to eat all of their choices within the course. In carefully choreographed hospitality, the host and hostess performed as manorial lord and lady (significantly, the word “lady” derives from the Old English for “bread-giver”) by physically portioning the most important foods. The meal was highly interactive and communal as guests helped serve the dishes nearest them, often with the assistance of servants. Etiquette books throughout the nineteenth century teach hosts and guests how to serve, with such useful gems as placing only dainty portions on the plate, for fear of squelching appetite, or stirring the gravy before ladling a bit to the side of the meat, to avoid serving only grease.