I’m at the Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island for a library conference. You may know that the Grand has formal dining service. As we are pre-season we were told the dress requirements would be waived but the food would be just as good. Excellent.
I had no trepidation entering the waters of a formal dining room. I was a little concerned about getting sick on the ferry, about hauling three tons of crap, about losing equipment I was responsible for and freezing up at the podium but lo! I am a fully grown and competent person who knows which type of champagne to serve in a mamosa (Cava) and I can name the noble grape varieties so I figured the Grand had nothing on me.
And yet, I have been defeated by the place setting at every meal. Yesterday at lunch they gave me three knives. Three! Now, I can handle three forks without thinking about it but three knives is just plain wrong. One was obviously a butter knife (good, one down), but the other two were identical and were not steak knives and the meal being served was vegetable tart. Utterly unhelpful.
At dinnerr last night they gave us three spoons. I evaluated the menu and used one for coffee, one for fruit, and one for soup. And yet, I chose different spoons than my tablemates for these various and sundry purposes. At home I would have run for my trusty “Joy of Cooking” that my sister-in-law gave me as a shower gift but here I was out of luck. I considered looking it up on my phone and determined it would be more embarrassing to look up which spoon to use than to use the wrong spoon. I have not regretted this judgment call but lo, I am still ignorant.
If a fourth fork shows up at my place setting today I’m going to cry shenanigans! on this hotel’s head.
Plum Librarian LLC 