🇨🇿 Tento článek si můžete přečíst i v češtině: Snídaně u Tiffanyho, večeře u Poirota
When Čapek visited H.G. Wells’ stately Essex manor one weekend and started to unpack his suitcase, its contents shocked the maid more than if she would have discovered a severed torso: the famous guest didn’t bring a smoking jacket with him! Despite his friend Vočadlo’s insistence that they would both require formal attire for dinner, Čapek paid no heed. He told his guide that Wells was a socialist, and besides, they were visiting him in the countryside. As the son of a doctor from Úpice, he had a strong distaste for formalities. It would have helped the anxious Vočadlo to draw a contemporary parallel with a fifteenth century German breviary or one from renaissance Italy; both became bestsellers centuries later (the feeling of panic that people experience when they are invited to dine in an unfamiliar environment has been around for ages). Maybe then, Čapek would have taken his word for it.
À La Something
As the magnificently filmed Agatha Christie detective stories remind us time and time again, ladies used to don long dresses to dinner, and men would wear black suits, even in the middle of fields and hills. And this was not only centuries before – not long ago, our friends came around for dinner, and I was so stunned when I saw them that they had to invite themselves in. They were dressed for a ball! But why? Was it simply because they were travelling to a notoriously conservative town (an hour away from London, it was given the title ‘Royal’ after Queen Victoria stayed at a local hotel there)?
Who would have imagined that the very same citizens spurned the fork for a whole century, dismissing it as ‘effeminate’ (they may have executed Charles I., but it was after his example that the English finally picked up a fork in the seventeenth century).
While the charming Mrs Wells called all the guests and requested that they only wear an informal blazer and tie (because of dear Karel) in the evening, we didn’t have enough tact to adapt to the grandiose style of our London guests, who arrived dressed head to toe in velvet.
But it is wonderful to watch dressed-up diners in historical series. Unless a young actress playing the duchess is holding her fork as though she were a maid. Holding a knife and fork incorrectly still irritates many an Englishperson more than an American accent; but in other aspects, the approach to table etiquette has radically transformed.
A Fancy Restaurant (Aka Torture Chamber)
Only thirty years ago, practically every fancy restaurant was a place for the indiscriminate torture of its customers. Unless the guest was an obvious member of the elite (through presentation, manners, dress, speech), the pompous waiter would proceed to pick on them from the moment they dared to set foot in a business where the stiffness of the staff matched the gleaming starched tablecloths.
The young man who had the audacity to top up a girl’s glass was reprimanded by the head waiter (‘I’m here to serve wine!’), while a man in an undertaker’s suit sadistically belittled a wretch who came to spend an unprecedented amount, only to impress a young woman. Few can imagine how restrictive western Europe used to be because of the suffocating formalities demanded unconditionally by such establishments. Strict dress codes, strict behavioural codes. Thankfully, over time, the owners of high-end restaurants realised that wanting money only from people who were able and willing to maintain certain behaviours was a foolishness that spelled death for their accounting books. Just like the deathly silence of a restaurant where the lone head waiter endlessly dusts an immaculately ironed tablecloth.
Wood on Wood
We generally realise that what goes on at home isn’t normal when we start visiting other families in our teens. Every Sunday, in our socialist Czechoslovak estate block, we would lay the table with a jacquard tablecloth, arranging porcelain, crystal and silver in quantities that could provide for an entire regiment.
We did not eat, nor feast, on Sundays. We dined. Given the nonexistence of a dishwasher, it was a sadomasochistic ritual; each of us had at least three glasses, a plate for appetizers, one for bread, one for soup, another for dessert, along with a host of corresponding cutlery. Our parents always invited other guests, so there were never fewer than six people. We sat for ages, while they led endless, passionate debates. Our parents took great pains with cooking meals, and with the exception of the two best hotels, they had the most diverse and delicious menu in Brno. But at what price! The minute the door closed behind the guests there ensued hours of incredibly boring washing up, polishing, drying and putting things away. It cured me of similar rituals for life, yet I continue to have a weakness for laying tables in interesting ways, beautiful (albeit eclectic) plates, glasses and floral arrangements. When I sit down at the table, I need to be able to admire what I see in front of me. And I feel ill at ease when no one talks at the table.
Theatre & Caviar, Opera & Picnic
The Eastern Bloc rose to fame in the west on account of its scarcity, but you would not have observed this as a visitor of ‘the country where tomorrow means yesterday.’ One of my most memorable experiences at a famous theatre in Moscow, where live horses appeared on the stage of Boris Godunov’s opera, were the slices of bread covered with a thick layer of first-rate caviar. During intervals it was hard to remain composed; like the majority of culture-loving visitors, I rushed up the stairs three steps at a time to reach the buffet on the top floor.
Aristocrats who, until today, live surrounded by staff (they number fewer than golden eagles) have one great advantage: they are separated from fridges and pantries by corridors, stairs and good upbringing. The aristocratic occupants of a house or castle don’t do as they please (unlike us), but rather adhere to a well-established order and age-old rituals. So strictly, in fact, that even Queen Victoria had to introduce ‘high tea,’ because the gap between lunch and dinner was unbearable long. She may have led the biggest empire of all times, but it was out of the question to pull out a bread roll with butter or a piece of cake simply because she felt peckish. Since then, high tea has become an English institution, a form of decadent feasting.
Exclusive Pack Animals
The repeatedly televised detective stories of Agatha Christie usually depict an English way of life that no longer exists in England today. Even the most entertaining lifestyle cannot do without a small army of qualified and devoted waiting staff.
Glyndebourne, a renowned opera house located in a paradisal garden which attracts opera lovers from spring to autumn, became popular thanks to its picnics, starting in 1934. Before the war, it sufficed for men to don a smoking jacket, and women a long gown. Comfortable chairs, folding mahogany tables and baskets overflowing with delicious food and drink were prepared for them and carried onto manicured lawns among blooming flowerbeds by servants.
That was before. Although nowadays, the upper classes are still exquisitely dressed and bedecked in jewellery, women no longer float in long gowns, nor do men swagger around in their perfectly-fitting outfits. Slouched, they stagger from the parking lot and through a field to the garden, saddled with cooling boxes, carrier bags or baskets and worn camping equipment. They are loaded up like donkeys, weighed down, panting – they can’t understand why I keep giggling during the procession.
When you pass through the picnic spreads, at a discreet distance, it’s immediately obvious. The bourgeoisie unpacks plastic-wrapped cheeses, salamis, olives and hummus from Marks & Spencer, while the impoverished nobility opposite drags out porcelain (the most eccentric have opulent silver candleholders). Those who don’t have a bunch of grown-up children (read: pack animals) work extra hard. But the resulting romantic atmosphere can be unforgettable, and even cheap wine tastes good from a beautiful goblet. The best champagne served in practical plastic, on the other hand…
It is no surprise, then, that the pragmatic bourgeoisie scattered the majority of the aristocracy. But the moment this class musters the social strength, they try to imitate lords. The result is always slightly comical, because the middle class can’t help themselves; the sweeping gestures and virtuosity of the aristocracy doesn’t suit them, even when it comes to a picnic (that’s why they’re often not as impoverished as nobles).
New and Better
Instagram cancelled the visual tedium of pubs, bistros and the majority of catering establishments. Anyone who wants to succeed needs to offer a pasture for the eyes. At times, restaurateurs overdo it in their attempt to look interesting, and beautiful visual combinations may be unpractical or hard to digest. It still beats the mess (nutrients tossed indifferently onto a plate) which we had to make do with until recently.
House of Interiors is not only a magazine, but also the main global authority on the lifestyles of the elite, the last nomads and eccentrics. The last issue showcased nine beautiful examples of fish knives. Special cutlery for eating fish is a favourite topic for Anglo-Saxon columnists; for their parents’ generation, it was an indispensable middle-class utensil (I personally encountered it for the first time at the start of the millennium, when I moved to London). Today it is ridiculed as an expression of snobbism. But when you examine this distinctly shaped knife (flat with a pointed tip), it seems to be the most practical tool for separating the meat from the small and treacherous bones. It is a classic example of why (the majority of) dining etiquette rules were invented. Not so that a conceited waiter could push customers around, nor so that the snob could have the upper hand; they were and are still here so that we can more easily handle the food in front of us. When someone is holding their cutlery correctly, it usually means they have it under control.
But the world and its cuisines are becoming so intermingled these days that it is more accurate to say that the younger generation has dining etiquette under control. While we felt cosmopolitan because we could manage eating with chopsticks, they know how to slurp ramen and can turn their heads so that crunchy arepas don’t drip down their clothing.
The world has (fortunately) moved forward, and dining etiquette with it. Formality has been replaced by curiosity and respect for other cultures, and in this aspect, the world has become more beautiful because of it. And even though starched, snow-white tablecloths have almost disappeared, the desire to lay the table beautifully and serve food in the most appetising way possible remains strong. Full of fantasy and playfulness.
And the rules?
There is only one last rule that holds true: if we want to enjoy lunch, we have to put our phones aside.
This article appeared in the eight issue of the print magazine N&N – Noble Notes
