Dining – Which bread plate is mine? Try BMW tip

Table Manners Advice

How to never use the wrong plate at a round table.

Round table roulette

Don’t you hate those darn round tables? At least at a square table it seems pretty obvious that all your plates are at your side of the table. Round tables test people’s dining etiquette knowledge.

Which bread plate is yours? Is it the one on your right or is your bread plate on your left? What if you take someone else’s plate?

What do you do, flip a coin?

Flip a coin, heads or tails? Or do you wait and hope that everybody else knows their table manners and gets it right so you end up with the proper bread plate? You don’t want to look rude or unsophisticated.

How to always get it right

You have a 50-50 chance of getting it right or wrong. Here’s a tip that will change the odds of getting it right to 100% in your favor.

The BMW tip

This little acronym advice should help you remember to always choose your correct bread plate. Think fancy eating and think fancy car like BMW. BMW; B for bread, M for meat (or main for you vegetarians) and W for water.

Works for any table shape

Your bread plate is on your left, your meat/main or dinner plate is in the center and your water or other glasses are on your right side. So voila, BMW!  This advice holds true for any shape of table. Your bread plate (sometimes called your bread and butter plate) is always on your left.

Memory helpers

Guys seem to like this BMW tip. It’s a car thing. There are other little memory helpers out there that work to remember your proper dining etiquette. (Our Dining For Success online video program shows another neat way to remind yourself) So ladies, if your boyfriend or husband has some bad table manners and gets it wrong, just give him a little BMW table manners advice.

Posted by Joanne Blake – Canadian Business and Dining Etiquette Expert and BMW admirer