How To Walk In High Heels: The Girl's Guide To Everything (22 page)

During the Victorian era everything gets terribly proper and, by heavens, does the cutlery drawer expand. Tomato servers, sardine forks, jelly knives, cheese scoops are among the popular innovations of the day.

And by the 1920s stainless steel is invented so people can stop polishing their silver. Cutlery is widespread and not just for Sunday best.

How to use chopsticks

‘Chinese food – you do not sew with a fork, and I see no reason why you should eat with knitting needles’
Miss Piggy

This section is not a reference to the first tune any pianist will learn, ‘Chopsticks’ (original name ‘The Celebrated Chop Waltz’), written in 1887, and now most mobile phones’ ringtone. No, not at all. In this context it refers to the eating implements of the orient, invented back in 3
BC
.

The tricky sticks keep you slim; don’t think it’s the food, it’s the lack of sustenance that reaches your mouth. You thought peas were hard, try rice with chopsticks. Serious social skill required.

Think of the chopsticks as a pair of prongs, or tweezers, that have broken. Chopsticks are operated only with your right hand. Put your middle and ring finger, three and four, on your thumb and you have a finger-shadow puppet of a dog’s head. This is the general idea with operating chopsticks: finger shadows and sticks.

One stick you keep stationary, the other you wiggle about to secure the food. To begin with it can feel like the arcade game, where you try in vain to grab the teddy bear.

1
   Take one stick first and hold it in your right hand, the way you would normally hold a pencil. If the stick has a thick and a thin end, or decorated and non-decorated hold it so that the thick/takeaway logo end is on top.

2
   Keeping the fingers in position, turn your hand inward until the stick is horizontal to the table, parallel to your body, and hovering above the food.

3
   Your thumb and forefinger should be clamping the stick at about its mid-point. The thumb should not be bent nor rigidly straight, while all your fingers should be curved slightly inwards.

4
   Now, take the other stick with your left hand and rest it on the protruding part of the ring finger of your right hand. Slide the stick towards the right, touching the tip of the middle finger and passing under the thumb until the thick end rests at the base joint of your forefinger. This is the stationary position of this stick, and it should be roughly parallel to the first stick.

5
   If this makes no sense, take the second stick, lie it just below the index finger and use this to wiggle it. Keep the lower stick steady and the upper stick looser to pivot and pick. You hardly need any grip until you have caught whatever morsel you intend to eat.

The chopstick is a multi-tasker; it serves the Japanese as fork, knife and spoon. They even eat soup and cut food into small morsels with it – which is just plain silly.

If all else fails, use your fingers and use the chopsticks as hair accessories, sushi-free of course.

How to eat with your fingers with style

So despair not if you cannot use cutlery, or chopsticks; you will not starve. There are foods that are best eaten by hand. It can also be very seductive. Just ensure that you don’t accidentally swallow a diamond. Loose jewellery should be removed and safely stored, ideally in handbag or pocket. Almost everything at cocktail parties or at pre-meal nibbles is ‘finger food’, proof that even the truly posh can make finger-licking appearances.

Artichoke, asparagus (providing it is not drenched in sauce), (crispy) bacon, bananas, biscuits, bread/baguettes, canapés, cherries, chocolates, corn on the cob, crisps, crudités, fast food, French fries, hors d’oeuvres, olives, oysters, seafoods, small berries, sushi, sweets and popcorn.

How to use a napkin

As well as being the perfect white flag for foes to surrender with, napkins can be very handy come dinnertime.

The napkin is a gentle and delicate accessory associated with the formalities and more refined art of dining. Therefore it is almost certain you will be using one. Regularly.

Remove the napkin from your place setting, unfold the origami creation and lay on your lap. In a very posh restaurant the waiter may dash over and do this for you. Don’t be too alarmed, he is not coming to throw you out.

Dab your lips and place napkin loosely next to your plate. It should not be folded, as you are not trying to save your hosts a wash bill, nor should it be too crumpled and twisted – you don’t want to imply that you are a nervous wreck. Also, caution: do not leave it on your seat. Superstition says that ‘a diner who leaves a napkin on his chair will never sit at that table again’. And you know how hard it is to get a good table at the Ivy.

How to appreciate wine

‘Promise me one thing: don’t take me home until I’m very drunk – very drunk indeed’
Holly Golightly
(
Audrey Hepburn
), in
Breakfast at Tiffany’s

Wine is a fermented alcoholic grape juice. The perfect party and socialising accessory, available in white, red or rosé. It is also an investment and, like a leather jacket, it really does get better with age. This is why bottles can become collectors’ items and vintage vineyards are tout le rage.

Ordering wine is one thing,
appreciating
wine is an art form but once you’ve got the knack of it you will think nothing of adding 40 per cent to your dinner tab on the beverage.

Some basic rules:

NEVER drink on an empty stomach. If you do, it suggests that your date has not bought you dinner and considers you a cheap date, or only worthy of being one, which is definitely not a good sign, but this is a whole other section.

NEVER mix and match. You wouldn’t mix styles and certain labels, and the same rule must apply with drink. Choose beer, spirit, wine – red or white. Make a decision and stick with it.

NEVER go beyond the dizzy, light-headed phase. At the vomiting and passing-out phase you cease to look even remotely attractive, and the hangover will counteract any pleasure.

DON’T try to match a man drink for drink. A woman’s tolerance is lower. Don’t enter into drinking competitions, unless it is your intention either to pass out, or be carried home.

Wine tasting

Wine tasting, sniffing and spitting may strike you as pretentious but, before you scoff, there is method in the madness.

A wine-tasting session is like going to a shoe store, with lots of different styles and brands on offer. You need to try a few to work out what best suits you, your taste and your mood. That said, the spitting bit should be skipped in restaurants, bars and any non-wine-tasting events.

Take the open bottle and pour a small ‘taste’ into the glass.

Lift the glass to your lips. Close your eyes. Slowly move the glass under your nose and inhale deeply. Let your mind take you on a journey to that smell: to the rich terracotta of the parched landscape, the rolling hills, the women with their shirtsleeves pushed up, and their skirts trailing along the dirt path . . . Wine tells a story, you have to listen and indulge it to experience it at its best.

A really exceptional bottle can transport your taste buds and mind. This is why it is so intoxicating and addictive, and so potentially expensive.

How to open a bottle

If you are at home and you do not have a dashing bartender, you will need to open the bottle, pour and serve yourself. This is much simpler than initially feared, but do practise, lots . . .

Firmly hold bottle of wine by the neck. The main body can be clamped between your knees if it is wriggling about but not if you have an audience. Remove all excess wrapping – reduce the layers you have to get through – and insert corkscrew into exposed cork at the top.

Twist bottle one way, and corkscrew another. The steel ringlet will sink, piercing further into the cork. Best to do this at an angle, particularly if it’s red you’re opening. Point it away from yourself in case of explosions or spillage – wine is a notoriously tough stain to shift.

When corkscrew feels firmly embedded in cork, you’ve got to go into reverse, so start to ease it out. Ideally go for a corkscrew with ‘arms’ that, when ready to be pulled, looks like a lady with hairy armpits, trapped in quicksand, arms raised above her head. The idea here is to push her arms back down, to reveal what look like frilly shoulder pads; much more pleasing to the eye.

Don’t panic, take it nice and slow.

Hey presto, wine should be open and ready to pour.

For Champagne you need a different knack as it is a fizzy drink, and therefore you have the build-up of bubbles to deal with. Think of all those images of Champagne bottles exploding and showering people. If you want to do that, shake the bottle. If not, execute operation with a steady hand. Pull off the wrapping, which in the past was lead-lined foil to keep the mice from nibbling it off, and under this you should find a wire-like garter.

Unscrew the wire cage, and keep your thumb on top of the cork so that it does not pop out until you are ready. The wire cage will have kept the cork in place, but once you loosen this safety net you have to be prepared.

Once the wire cage is off hold the cork in one hand and the bottle in the other. You will notice that these corks are slightly domed so you cannot use a corkscrew on sparkling wines, you have to use a firm grip. Turn the bottle, not the cork; ease the cork off slowly, rather than tug and experience an explosion.

Once the cork pops out it will expand, and will not return to stop the bottle so you better pour for as many friends as you can find.

How to tell if it’s corked

‘Corked’ is wine lingo, and the polite way of saying the wine has turned, and is off. Yuk. This usually happens when air has got into the bottle, or it has been badly stored. There is usually a slight ‘ting’ to the smell, which should be an initial warning, but if it tastes like soggy corrugated cardboard, crusty socks or furry mushrooms it’s definitely corked so you have to send it back. Don’t be shy.

Red wine

Reds are fruity, rich, juicy, with berry taste and deep colour. They are best served with red meats, casseroles, smelly cheeses and strong rich flavours on cold winter evenings, with candlelight.

It should be served in big glasses so that the wine can breathe and swirl around unrestricted.

Red wine is sultry, sexy, sophisticated and brunette. Think Sophia Loren, Jayne Mansfield combined with Coco Chanel. Consequently it is best served wearing: pencil skirts, tight cashmere jumpers, red lipstick, pearls, fishnets and stilettos. Or large jumpers, soft subtle make-up, curled up in a log cabin on a sheepskin rug in front of a roaring fire.

The best vines are grown on well-drained, low-fertile soils. The wine is made from small black-blue grapes with thick skins, which produce deeply coloured, full-bodied wines with notable tannins. Its spiritual home is the Bordeaux regions Médoc and Graves which have piercing blackcurrant fruits that develop complex smoky cedarwood nuances when fully mature. The vines that produce this wine are also grown in California, and create a rich mixture of cassis, mint, eucalyptus and vanilla oak. They are also planted across Australia, with particular success in Coonawara, where they are suited to the famed terra rossa soil and in Italy, where they are a key component in Super Tuscans. Like all great reds it is rich, yet has a fruity, plummy taste with blackcurrant, berry and even peppery notes to confuse the taste buds. There are the collectors’ items as well as the downright cheap and nasty variety, a wine to suit all budgets and boyfriends.

The Merlot grape is adaptable to most soils and is relatively simple to cultivate. It requires savage pruning – over-cropped Merlot-based wines are diluted and bland. It is also vital to pick at just the right time as Merlot can quickly lose its key characteristics if it is harvested overripe. The best wines are found in St-Emilion and Pomerol, where they withstand the moist clay-rich soils far better than Cabernet grapes. At its best it produces opulently rich, plummy clarets with succulent fruitcake-like nuances. Le Pin, Pétrus and Clinet are examples of hedonistically rich Merlot wines at their very best. Merlot is now grown in virtually all wine-growing countries and is particularly successful in California, Chile and northern Italy.

Pinot Noir has been described as ‘probably the most frustrating, and at times infuriating, wine grape in the world’. Makes you love it before you’ve taken a sip. However when it is successful, it can produce some of the most sublime wines known to man. A thin-skinned grape which grows in small, tight bunches, it performs best on well-drained, deepish, limestone-based subsoils, like the ones found on Burgundy’s Côte d’Or. This wine is lighter in colour, body and tannins. However, the best wines have grip, complexity and an intensity of fruit seldom found in wine from other grapes. Young Pinot Noir can smell almost sweet, redolent with freshly crushed raspberries, cherries and redcurrants. When mature, the best wines develop a sensuous, silky-mouth feel with the fruit flavours deepening and gamey,
sous-bois
nuances emerging. The best examples are still found in Burgundy, although the Pinot Noir’s grape also plays a key role in Champagne. It should be remembered that it is grown throughout the world, with notable success in the Carneros and Russian River Valley districts of California, and the Martin borough and Central Otago regions of New Zealand.

White wines

Whites are light and flirty, ripe and fruity, more acidic than red, with creamy vanilla base notes. Best served in tall, thin and icy glasses. Ideal with salmon, roast chicken, and pasta.