Imagine setting the table for a 7-course meal for 18 guests

ASHEVILLE, N.C. — Imagine yourself as one of 18 dinner guests in the massive banquet hall in America’s largest home.

Now imagine you're the one that has to set the table!

For the first time in many years, the 40-foot long banquet hall table has been set with its full Gilded Age finery, as it was when George and Edith Vanderbilt lived in the Biltmore House in the early 1900s.

A Vanderbilt House Party – The Gilded Age takes visitors on a tour of Biltmore House through rooms where they can learn how George and Edith Vanderbilt and their friends and family spent their days on the estate, as well as how staff worked below stairs to pull off a gala evening.

The exhibition features elegant fashions recreated based on fashions worn by the Vanderbilts and their guests at turn-of-the-century celebrations known as house parties. Oscar-winning designer John Bright and his team at Cosprop in London collaborate with Biltmore’s curatorial team to make the clothing.

Here is the actual menu from the 1904 meal the table setting is based upon for this exhibition. To add to the ambiance, curators created faux versions of some of the dishes served that evening. Guests will be able to see some of these items in the kitchen and the butler’s pantry along the Biltmore House tour.

·         First Course (Soup): Puree of Tomatoes

·         Second Course (Fish): Fish Mousse with Lobster Sauce

·         Third Course (Entrée): Braised Calves Brains

·         Fourth Course (Roast or relevé): Roast Turkey with Cranberry, Sweet Potatoes, Spinach and Cream Celery

·         Fifth Course: (Game and Salad): Hot Tongue and Salade

·         Sixth Course (Dessert): Charlotte Russe

·         Seventh Course (Coffee): Coffee

· 1 dinner plate

· 4 forks - 1 each for the entrée, roast, fish and game courses

· 3 knives - 1 each for the entrée, roast and fish courses

· 1 soup spoon

· 6 glasses – a glass for sherry, claret, champagne, burgundy, a hock glass and a tumbler for water

· 1 napkin

· 1 piece of bread inside the napkin

· 1 place card

· 8 salt cellars

· 8 salt spoons

· 4 salvers (serving tray)

· 5 tazzas (serving dish with pedestal)

· 9 baskets

· 4 candelabra

· 1 tablecloth

· 1 epergne (tiered serving piece)

Cox Media Group