Twitter Users Share Their Best Horror Stories from Fancy Dinner Experiences

updated May 28, 2019

Page URL

We independently select these products—if you buy from one of our links, we may earn a commission. All prices were accurate at the time of publishing.

Fancy dining — whether that means simply outside your own house, or perhaps in a chateau in France — is fraught with etiquette that people are just somehow supposed to know. It’s likely hard to find a person who hasn’t experienced at least a few minutes of mortification because they used the fish fork for appetizers or thought the corkage fee should be waived because, after all, we’d opened the bottle ourselves while waiting for the table (um, the latter was my husband).

A couple weeks ago, writer and Twitter queen Nicole Cliffe opened a thread for commiseration about these moments.

The responses range from terrifying (a lot of people have eaten wasabi, whether out of confusion or because of a prank) to hilarious (most of the ones involving butlers and maids land here, because people rich enough for such things should be able to afford a little humility for those of us who do not), and right back on to “Welp, can’t go back to that country ever again.”

Wine, in particular, causes consternation. Malia’s friend saw my husband’s corkage confusion and raised the bar, describing the time a friend ordered the “cork-AHZH,” as it was the cheapest thing on the menu. “I’m sorry sir, we’re all out of the corkage fee,” said the waiter, saving the day.

Meanwhile, Natalie was offended at the tiny pour she got in her glass to taste it when she first ordered a bottle.

Speaking of drinking, how about a little (oops!) holy water from Lourdes?

But honestly, how are you supposed to know things like that sweetmeats are candies and sweetbreads are glands (unless you’re in Mexico, then scratch that). If nothing else, this thread proves that mistakes can be made in so many ways: there was Andrew, who moistened his fingers in his neighbor’s consommé, thinking it was a finger bowl, and then there was Amy, whose palate cleanser turned out to be a finger bowl. They don’t even have to be too fancy, the thread has shrimp tail eating (how would you ever guess?), egg-ordering (well-done, please), and a cry for help that anyone who has ever eaten cheese can probably relate to: “Sometimes cheese rinds are edible and even delicious and sometimes they are flatly not food, and I REALLY FEEL THIS DISTINCTION SHOULD BE MORE VISIBLE.”

Read, commiserate, and maybe even add your own to the party.