Buffet style christmas dinner ideas the furniture of the same name, see Sideboard. Still life with fruits, nuts, and large wheels of cheese. The essential feature of the various buffet formats is that the diners can directly view the food and immediately select which dishes they wish to consume, and usually also can decide how much food they take.
Buffets are effective for serving large numbers of people at once, and are often seen in institutional settings, business conventions, or large parties. Since a buffet involves diners serving themselves, it has in the past been considered an informal form of dining, less formal than table service. In recent years, however, buffet meals are increasingly popular among hosts of home dinner parties, especially in homes where limited space complicates the serving of individual table places. At balls, the “buffet” was also where drinks were obtained, either by circulating footmen supplying orders from guests, but often by the male guests. During the Victorian period, it became usual for guests to have to eat standing up. This custom had its prime during the early 18th century.
The smörgåsbord table was originally a meal where guests gathered before dinner for a pre-dinner drink, and was not part of the formal dinner that followed. The smörgåsbord buffet was often held in separate rooms for men and women before the dinner was served. Smörgåsbord became internationally known as “smorgasbord” at the 1939 New York World’s Fair exhibition, as the Swedes had to invent a new way of showcasing the best of Swedish food to large numbers of visitors. While the possession of gold and silver has been a measure of solvency of a regime, the display of it, in the form of plates and vessels, is more a political act and a gesture of conspicuous consumption. During the 18th century, more subtle demonstrations of wealth were preferred. The buffet was revived in England and France at the end of the century, when new ideals of privacy made a modicum of self-service at breakfast-time appealing, even among those who could have had a footman servant behind each chair. In a 1922 housekeeping book entitled How to Prepare and Serve a Meal, Lillian B.