Table Manners

Proper conduct at the dinner table is becoming a lost art.  The following is a list of things everyone should consider when sitting down to eat.

Conduct at the dining Table

Before coming to the table, be clean, neat, appropriately dressed (wearing a shirt and hair combed) and wash & dry your hands.  Be on time.

  1. Your napkin should be placed in your lap, folded halfway.
  2. The first person to take a bite of food should be the person who prepared the meal.
  3. Sit up straight with both feet on the floor.
  4. Never rest your arms/elbows on the table.
  5. Eat with one hand and rest the other in your lap.
  6. Men and boys can help women be seated (pull out their chair).
  7. Talk only of pleasant things at the table, and don’t interrupt another person.
  8. Don’t talk with food in your mouth.
  9. Never say you don’t like something that is being served.  Take a small helping and eat it out of respect for the cook and host.  You don’t have to have seconds.
  10. Food is passed to the right.
  11. Do not overload your plate.
  12. Chew with your mouth closed.
  13. When serving yourself, be sure and use the serving utensil, not you own utensils.
  14. When eating soup, spoon away from yourself.
  15. Never reach for food, say, “Would you please pass the _____.”
  16. Before talking or drinking, be sure you do not have food in your mouth.
  17. Never spit food out if it is too hot.  Drink water to cool off the food.
  18. Use your napkin to clean you mouth and hands before getting up from the table.
  19. If you must sneeze at the table, use your napkin and sneeze downward and away from others and your plate.
  20. You may leave to table when everyone is finished.  Children may ask to be excused early if adults wish to stay and talk.  Children should address whoever prepared the meal and say, “I enjoyed my meal, may I be excused?”
  21. When finished, place napkin to the left side of your plate, or if plate has been removed where plate was.
  22. When leaving the table, be sure to push your chair under the table.

Men – Remove hat or cap at table.

Restaurant – If you drop a utensil, do not pick it up.  The waiter will bring you another one.

Cutting Meat

  1.  Only cut two to three pieces at a time.

 2.  When finished cutting, lay the knife on the plate and use your fork for eating.

Bread and Butter

  1. If the table includes a butter plate, bread and butter are placed on this plate.
  2. Never eat bread when you have an eating utensil in either hand.
  3. When not in use, the butter knife remains on the butter plate.