General Dining Etiquette

Formal Dining: General Etiquette - as part of the expert series by GeoBeats. When the meal is beginning, you will want to pass the bread. And I have some bread here for us on a lovely plate. Everything goes around to the right. So if I am going to pass the bread to someone I am going to hold it like this, look at them, nod and smile and pass the bread. I do not normally take my bread first, however in this case for the demonstration I will take a piece of bread. I going to take the bread, touching only the piece that I am going to eat, set it on my plate. And here we have a butter dish, we are going take that lid off, use the butter like this, putting it onto my plate and then I would break the bread in a bite size piece, butter only that, bring it directly to my mouth like this, rather than half way and moving my bread while I chat with my guests. Prior to eating anything you do not want to salt or pepper or season it before you taste it. So in this case I would taste whatever is in front of me and decide if it needs seasoning, then I would take it like this and season accordingly. You do not even sip your water prior to the host beginning the meal, and when you are sipping any beverage you would drink out of only one position, particularly for ladies, in case the lipstick is then all the way around the glass.