How to Host a Dinner to Silver Service Standards
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Thomas Powell
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Published on Wednesday 17th 2010
Dinner parties are a pretty versatile social event They allow you to entertain people around your house and show off your culinary prowess, making your favourite dishes and allowing friends, family and colleagues to experience them too
Dinner parties are a pretty versatile social event. They allow you to entertain people around your house and show off your culinary prowess, making your favourite dishes and allowing friends, family and colleagues to experience them too. When you start planning an event such as this, there are so many elements to consider: from the food you serve, the wine you will drink, the table layout you will use and, maybe the most important, what you want the tone of the evening to be.
One tone that you may decide on is really formal, and where the guests are the epitome of importance. One way of carrying out this theme is to re-enact a silver service dining experience.
Generally carried out in the most formal restaurants and in some homes across the country, silver service is not used that much anymore, but is an extremely good way of working at meal times and can be very fun to try out. With meals such as Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner, you may find that you naturally carry out a silver service style. That is that you bring all of the food out to the table in tureens, on platters or in bowls, and then each person will be given the quantity that they want. The difference being, that someone will go around and actually serve each guest, or else have the plate passed to them so they can fill it up, rather than people helping themselves to the portions they desire or the main food (e.g. the cooked joint of meat or whatever makes up the body of the meal). The tradition goes that the serving will start with the person directly to the left of the host, and then go clockwise.
Serving in this way puts the emphasis on the guest and makes them feel that little bit more special. There are other techniques that are associated with silver service, but not all of them need to be applied for a dinner party experience. If you want to though, then this can take it to the next level of formality. For example, a designated fork and spoon are generally used to serve up the components from the platters, and these were originally made from silver (hence the name ‘silver service’).
Keeping the utensils silver is something that most households will not be able to maintain when hosting a silver service style party, but you can easily mimic it with stainless steel to stay in keeping with the theme. The table layout will also have to be specific for silver service. You can look up guides, but just remember simple rules, like putting the wine glasses diagonally for each place, in the order of use. A water glass will also need to be at the front.
Clear places from the right, the opposite way to how the food is served, and just remember to provide entertainment for your guests too. It is a formal way of dealing with hosting, but there is no need for it to be boring because of this, so make sure your guests have a good, fun time and can leave feeling pampered.
One tone that you may decide on is really formal, and where the guests are the epitome of importance. One way of carrying out this theme is to re-enact a silver service dining experience.
Generally carried out in the most formal restaurants and in some homes across the country, silver service is not used that much anymore, but is an extremely good way of working at meal times and can be very fun to try out. With meals such as Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner, you may find that you naturally carry out a silver service style. That is that you bring all of the food out to the table in tureens, on platters or in bowls, and then each person will be given the quantity that they want. The difference being, that someone will go around and actually serve each guest, or else have the plate passed to them so they can fill it up, rather than people helping themselves to the portions they desire or the main food (e.g. the cooked joint of meat or whatever makes up the body of the meal). The tradition goes that the serving will start with the person directly to the left of the host, and then go clockwise.
Serving in this way puts the emphasis on the guest and makes them feel that little bit more special. There are other techniques that are associated with silver service, but not all of them need to be applied for a dinner party experience. If you want to though, then this can take it to the next level of formality. For example, a designated fork and spoon are generally used to serve up the components from the platters, and these were originally made from silver (hence the name ‘silver service’).
Keeping the utensils silver is something that most households will not be able to maintain when hosting a silver service style party, but you can easily mimic it with stainless steel to stay in keeping with the theme. The table layout will also have to be specific for silver service. You can look up guides, but just remember simple rules, like putting the wine glasses diagonally for each place, in the order of use. A water glass will also need to be at the front.
Clear places from the right, the opposite way to how the food is served, and just remember to provide entertainment for your guests too. It is a formal way of dealing with hosting, but there is no need for it to be boring because of this, so make sure your guests have a good, fun time and can leave feeling pampered.