“Just as at a dinner party this week on Madison Avenue a green kid glove was laid by the place of each guest to be put on and used while eating olives.” — from “While the Auto Waits,” by O. Henry.
Dear Etiquetteer:
I am finally getting back to restaurants after the pandemic, but things are changing. At a new place I went to for lunch, my burger came with fries, but they were served in a tiny brown paper bag standing up on the plate, about two inches high. Is this, as you say, Perfectly Proper? And what is the best way to eat them when they’re served like this? Is it acceptable to eat them from the bag, or do I empty the fries onto my plate and then put the bag someplace else? Help!
Dear Fried:
Etiquetteer is happy to help, and the first order of business is to encourage you to keep calm. A meal is temporary, and it’s just French fries.
Your query immediately made Etiquetteer think of that situation from O. Henry at the top of this column — one of his typical, delightful inventions — and how the jaded palate needs to be refreshed with more than just a new recipe. We’re so used to French fries in paper envelopes at fast food joints, why on earth not do the same thing at a sit-down restaurant? So many white tablecloth steakhouses have bridged casual to formal service by serving fries in little silver buckets, this seems like the logical next step to reduce both storage and dishwashing needs.
The Down Home Style of a brown paper bag* on the table of a “nice” restaurant also brings to mind the New York trend several years ago of serving top-notch cocktails in Mason jars; that was a little bit like Marie Antoinette’s toy farm Le Hameau, the supreme example of the Rich acting like Just Folks. Etiquetteer lays a wreath on the death of that trend without regret. Cocktails go best in Mason jars when they are being transported for picnics or other entertainments. (Etiquetteer always looks forward to the visits of particular friends whose “homemade tomato sauce” is really a Mason jar full of Little Italys.)
But Etiquetteer digresses. How to eat French fries with Perfect Propriety changes with the utensils available. The more likely you are to see a fork on the table, the more likely, but not definitively, it is that you use it for your fries. It’s also true that the more likely you are to see a tablecloth at a restaurant, the less likely, but not definitively, you are to see fries on the menu. However you choose to consume them, don’t call attention to yourself. Discretion is the best courtesy at table. If you can’t pick up your fries without getting ketchup on them, use your silverware. Obviously that means taking them out of the tiny bag, which you can fold and slip under the rim of your plate. No need to clutter up the table with that trash.
Etiquetteer wishes you sufficient servings to tasty fries and bon appétit.
*It was a plain brown paper bag, wasn’t it? Branding would have been too much like fast food.