Reading the place setting
Your bread plate is on your left and your glasses are on your right. If you forget, touch each forefinger to its thumb under the table: the left hand makes a lowercase b for bread and the right makes a d for drinks. Forks sit to the left of the plate, and knives and spoons to the right, arranged in the order they will be used. A fork and spoon laid horizontally above the plate are for dessert. If you take a neighbor's bread plate by mistake, say nothing and carry on.
Before and during the meal
- Wait to start until everyone at your table has been served, or until the host begins or tells you to go ahead.
- Follow the host's lead on how many courses to order, and stay out of the most expensive line on the menu when someone else is paying.
- Pass dishes to the right, and pass the salt and pepper together even when only one was asked for.
- Put butter on your bread plate first, then tear off one bite-sized piece of bread at a time and butter that.
- Spoon soup away from you, and sip from the side of the spoon.
- Keep your phone off the table entirely, face down included.
Pace and signals
Dining is paced conversation as much as it is eating. Glance at the other plates now and then. If you are well ahead, put your fork down and talk. If you are behind, talk less for a few minutes. No one should be left chewing alone while the rest of the table waits, and no one should be watched while they finish. To pause, rest your knife and fork apart on the plate with the tips toward the center. To signal that you are finished, lay them side by side with the handles at four o'clock and the tips at ten.
The check
The person who extended the invitation pays. If that was you, settle it smoothly by handing your card to the server away from the table or before the check arrives, so that there is no tussle over it. Among friends splitting a bill, split it evenly unless someone plainly ate and drank far less. In an American restaurant with table service, tip eighteen to twenty percent of the total before tax.
Tip When you are unsure what to do with anything on the table, wait five seconds and watch the host. Nobody notices hesitation, and everybody notices a wrong guess.
