Now we really are getting obscure! I’ve only been served demitasse once. On the hubster and my second anniversary, we traveled to France and had dinner in a chateau in the Loire Valley, (schmancy, I know). It was eight courses with the complimentary wines, at the end I was served a demitasse coffee with a demitasse spoon that had been dipped in chocolate. Normally, I wouldn’t drink coffee at such a late hour, but after all those courses of food and all that wine, it kept me from going into a coma and I finally understood how and why people drank it.
“According to the latest dinner etiquette in France, coffee is served for both the men and women at the dinner table. But when the dinner is very large and fashionable, it is still customary for the women to retire to the drawing-room, where the hostess presides over the coffee-urn.”
Book of Etiquette by Lillian Eichler, 1922
“Black coffee is always served after a formal dinner. The filled, tiny coffee cups, with a sugar bowl in which is loaf or crystal sugar, are passed on a silver tray by servants, who return to the drawing room about fifteen minutes later for the cups. Some hostesses prefer to pour the coffee themselves and have the coffee pot and coffee cups brought to the drawing room on a tray. This is rarely done if the party is strictly formal.”
The New American Etiquette by Lily Haxworth Wallace, 1941
Now, you probably don’t have any servants. I certainly don’t, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t enjoy coffee after dinner and really, that’s all that demitasse is – small cups of joe served as a pick me up or final call after a long meal.
“Demitasses are traditionally served in the living room after dinner parties or, if the men and women have separated, demitasses are brought to the women in the living room after the men have been served in the dining room. At all luncheons, however, both the men and women leave the dining room together and the coffee may be served in the living room, on the terrace, or wherever the hostess decided. Little cups and saucers are always used for the formal service of coffee after meals, but never at other times.”
Vogue’s Book of Etiquette, 1969
“Prepare 4 servings espresso or double-strength coffee. Serve in demitasse cups and accompany with chocolate mints. Demitasse is often served with a twist of lemon peel. Sugar may be offered but cream is usually avoided.”
Betty Crockers’s Dinner Parties, 1974
Sometimes sweet wine or port are offered as well. In the film Babette’s Feast, (I know, I can’t shut up about that film, I love it so) they serve demitasse with sweet champagne. This, I have been told, was a common European practice.
To be honest, I love decaf coffee in the evening and demitasse seems the perfect amount – so this is one tradition I may want to bring back with a few modern tweaks. I might even try serving it with a twist of lemon peel. How about you? I hope you’re well and happy, Cheri
