The forks
The salad fork, the outermost utensil to the left of your plate, may have a thicker left tine and is smaller than a dinner fork. If you're dining in a true French restaurant, the salad fork is set closest to your plate because the salad course is served after the entree.
You can hold your dinner fork, situated immediately left of the plate, two ways: American-style, tines-up in your dominant hand and anchored between your middle finger and thumb, or European-style, tines-down in your left hand with your index finger extended along the back. Rest your utensils tines-up, blade-in vertically on the sides of your plate when you are not using them. The handles should not touch the table again once you have used your flatware.
A fish fork is typically delivered before the fish course, and it is smaller than the dinner fork. Before stainless steel was introduced in the 1920s, when most utensils were made of steel, fish forks were traditionally made of sterling silver, which does not react with lemon or other acidic sauces often served with fish.
The knives
The salad knife is the outermost knife in the setting.
The dinner knife, placed directly to the right of the plate, is used for the salad and fish course if additional knives are not set. To use a knife in the American way: Pin food with the fork tine-down in your nondominant hand and cut with the knife in the dominant hand, lay the knife across the edge of the plate, then switch the fork back to the dominant hand to spear and ear the morsel. The Euro way: Cut and corral food onto the fork using the knife in the dominant hand, keeping the fork in the nondominant hand to deliver the bite. After using your knife, lay it blade-in across the top right edge of your plate.
A steak knife is usually delivered with the meat course.
A teaspoon is placed during coffee service, or sits between the knife and soupspoon.
A soupspoon is the outermost utensil to the right of the plate. The bowl of a spoon should not pass through your lips in a restaurant. You can slurp out of the can at home, but in public, dip your soupspoon away from your body, scoop three-quarters of a spoonful, then bring the edge of the spoon to your lips, tilt the bowl slightly, and sip.
Dessert flatware is usually placed at the top of the plate with the bowl of the spoon pointing left and fork tines to the right, or it may be set with the dessert course.
The glasses
There's absolutely no risk of grabbing your neighbour's glassware in a formal table setting -- a grouping that can contain up to five different vessels -- if you can remember that your glasses are always on the right side of your plate. Your waiter will fill each glass with the appropriate liquid and remove and set glasses as needed, depending on what you order to sip.
Should your life depend on selecting the right glassware in a blindfold test, this will save your skin: The water goblet is laid at one o'clock above the dinner knife and is the glass farthest left in the grouping. In übertraditional, multicourse place settings, a small sherry or aperitif glass may be set above and to the right of the water glass. Your red wineglass, which typically has a more bulbous bowl, sits to the right of the water glass. The white wineglass has a narrower bowl and may be set slightly below, but always to the right of the red wineglass. A champagne flute, if one is set, is placed above and between the red and white wineglasses.
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 | Excerpted from The Mere Mortal's Guide to Fine Dining by Colleen Rush. Copyright 2006 by Colleen Rush. Excerpted by permission of Broadway Publishers. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher. |
