Stories of best (and worst) table decor
Regina Murphy
Wednesday, November 8, 2006
We’ve all been there: the food is ready, the house is clean, the guests are due and you suddenly realize you don’t have anything in the middle of the table except a banana hanger with two very brown bananas on it.
What to do?!? We’re not all Martha Stewart, with a huge pantry of party items suitable to any occasion, and not too many florists are open at 7pm. Here are some stories of best (and worst) dressed tables to inspire and caution you as the entertaining season opens.
Having one or two items that can hold things is so helpful. I have two pottery platters in different colors, one bright, one neutral. They can hold a single object, a group of objects or even water. I can display a gorgeous pomegranate, a trio of candles in a bed of rice, a chunk of ocean coral in glass beads, or float flowers in water. Those two platters “save my bacon” every time!
Kristi Mohn has a wonderful antique wooden trough that is perfectly proportioned to her buffet and dining table. She often displays a row of beautifully colored and proportioned fruit — three Bosc pears, five Granny Smith apples, a row of lemons — it’s rustic yet very sophisticated. The lines are clean and the colors are limitless!
Myrna Comstock, a doyenne of entertaining in Emporia, wrote to me about her mother Jane Millikan’s holiday table adventure. Myrna says, “My brother Jimmy had crafted Mother a wooden candelabra made of walnut wood in his high school shop class. Mother treasured it and for the last 30 years always used it as her Christmas centerpiece on the dining room table.
A few years ago my other brother, Michael, was visiting her and she had the candelabra all lit up and the table decked out in holiday finery. I don't know if she and Michael had been knocking back a few nogs or what, but they decided to make a run to Wal-Mart and forgot to put out the candles. They returned home to screeching fire alarms, howling dogs and a house full of smoke. The entire top of her dining table was charred black! (Unfortunately the table was a cute French Provincial number given to Mother by my Aunt Jessie. So TWO of my future heirlooms went up in smoke that day!)”
Where was Smoky the Bear? Remember people, never leave candles unattended.
Myrna also said, “I'd like to mention that Elaine Edwards always has the most beautiful centerpieces. I remember once she used seashells, little gold stars, and I think maybe some glitter. They were sort of clustered in the center, with the glitter and stars around the edges of the display. The only light in the room was from candles which cast a golden glow around the table. It was so elegant!” Of course, just like Elaine herself.
Myrna has a good point there. It’s really nice to have some sort of light on the table, so that faces have light on them and not straight down from the ceiling casting shadows under everyone's eyes. I try to think about what people are going to see behind the people they are facing. Is it the kitchen? The picture window? Or, in my case, the crack in the wall plaster?
One of my favorite catering stories deals with a seated outdoor party for 300 guests of the mayor of Memphis, Tenn. This was a formal event celebrating his election to office as well as the opening of a major art exhibit. There was a ton of food, and the menu called for 7 courses with European formal setting: that meant about 6 plates, 2 bowls, 7 different drinking glasses and about 12 different pieces of cutlery for one place setting. Each round table seated 10 guests, and we started setting the tables 5 hours before the event was to start.
The centerpieces for these thirty tables were designed and built by a relation of the mayor’s, who, having an apparently limitless budget to work with, imported 700 white tulips from France, to be displayed in large round glass bowls of water atop a tripod of long, narrow pieces of driftwood. It was amazing! A tower of almost 4 feet, those svelte wooden sticks, laced together with a little florist’s wire, balancing an incredibly heavy bowl of water filled with 25 huge, white tulips.
Of course, it wasn’t long before one of these gave way completely, crashing a tulip bomb down into the middle of the table, showering all of the settings and linens with water and broken glass! You should have seen the commotion. Once the larger shards were cleared, my staff gathered around the table, pulled up the edges of the tablecloth and bundled the whole disaster together like a giant sack: 60 plates, 20 bowls, 70 different drinking glasses, 120 pieces of cutlery, 3 sticks of driftwood and 25 very unhappy tulips. Straight to the dumpster!
Next week we’ll have some great Thanksgiving side dishes. I’ll be on the road for Turkey Day, so you’ll get another serving of Betty Boylan’s cookbook collection for the week after. See you Tuesday at the Taste of Home cooking school. Let’s get cooking!