The dessert may be of any cold sweets, and if ices are used they should be of the punch order—one of the many varieties known as Roman, Siberian, creole, cardinal, etc. If crackers and cheese are not served with the salad, they may be passed at the close of the breakfast. Brie, Gorgonzola, or Roquefort may be used.
At a breakfast of ceremony the tea or coffee tray is never placed on the table, but breakfast coffee or cocoa is served in large cups after the fruit, and is passed by the butler, instead of being poured by the hostess. Tea may also be offered. Wines are not strictly selon les règles at a breakfast, although occasionally claret is served about the middle of the meal.
The waiting at such a breakfast as this is about as ceremonious as it would be at a luncheon. No large dishes are placed on the table, but everything is passed by the butler or waitress. Each dish may go the rounds, and the guests be allowed to help themselves, or a plate containing a portion may be placed by the butler in front of each person. The guest always helps himself to cheese and hors-d'œuvres, but the ices are served separately on plates. Bouquets de corsage, boutonnières, cards and menus are not necessary at a breakfast.
A wedding breakfast is conducted on much the same line as that described above, except that there are usually fewer hot and more cold dishes served, such as salmon, lobster, or chicken à la mayonnaise, boned turkey and chicken, pâté-de-foie-gras, jellied tongue and fowl, and a greater variety of such sweets as creams and jellies. Wines, too, are quite comme il faut.
The giving of a breakfast need not be a matter of dread to the hostess who has confidence in her cook and waitress. The menu suggested may be so modified or increased as to make it as simple or as elaborate as preference may dictate. A breakfast is a pleasant style of entertainment, for, while both sexes are admitted, as at dinner, there is not the formality of dress essential at that meal, the men appearing in morning coats, and the women in handsome high-necked and long-sleeved house or calling costumes.
FAMILY BREAKFASTS FOR SPRING
WHILE the principal features of the home breakfast remain essentially the same throughout the year, variety is gained by adapting the different articles of food to the season of the year in which they are served. A lighter, less carbon-producing diet is not only more agreeable, but more healthful, in warm weather than one containing much animal food, while the latter is preferable and almost necessary in winter. To this consideration is added the eminent propriety of making one's bills of fare seasonable, and thus achieving fitness and economy.