We'll Eat Again in Quotes

Living in style: a Duchess conceives it to consist in taking her breakfast at three o'clock in the afternoon—dining at eight—playing at Faro till four the next morning—supping at five, and going to bed at six—and to eat green peas and peaches in January. (Pierce Egan, Life in London, 1821)

A dinner of boiled fish, and of plain vegetables destined to be mixed by way of sauce with all one eats – a piece of roast beef cut from the hardest and most tasteless part of the carcase... Chairs with rush bottoms, sometimes covered with a cushion, which the least movement causes to fall to the ground. (A foreign visitor describes the British home circa 1850. Things hadn't changed much in the 1950s.)

Rejecting all dishes whereof Lady Tippins partakes: saying aloud when they are proffered to her, 'No, no, no, not for me. Take it away!' (Our Mutual Friend, Charles Dickens, 1864 A Victorian banquet was like a tasting menu or buffet, and you didn’t have to eat everything. There might be a printed menu so you knew what was coming up.)

Don't, when you drink, elevate your glass as if you were going to stand it inverted on your nose. Bring the glass perpendicularly to the lips, and then lift it to a slight angle. Drink sparingly while eating. It is far better for the digestion not to drink tea or coffee until the meal is finished. Drink gently, and not pour it down your throat like water turned out of a pitcher.  It is not proper to drink with a spoon in the cup; nor should one, by-the-way, ever quite drain a cup or glass. (The White House Cook Book, 1887)

You had to have, when you ate, one food brought in after another, each with fresh plates and different kinds of instruments to eat them with, as if on purpose to take time and trouble the servants. (Crewe Train, Rose Macaulay, 1926)

The 1910s dining table, which would be dotted with olives, salted almonds, sugared green peppermints, and chocolates in cut-glass bowls or silver dishes. (Cecil Beaton, The Glass of Fashion, 1954)

I seem to remember that, in those far gone days, the waiter took his order from just one of the diners, usually the one who would be paying the bill. So, say, wife and children would say what it was they wanted and Father would relay the order to the waiter, editing it as required… When a couple was out together, the convention was that the man would order and pay, all those years ago. If a group of men were dining out together, other than at their club, again, it would be assumed that one of their number would be the host, (even if they shared the cost afterwards) and he would be the one to place the order. (A friend writes.)

More here, and links to the rest.