For some reason we are missing teaspoons. We have the exact same number of big forks, small forks, tablespoons, and knives, but the teaspoons have dwindled to less than five. I am not sure if we have three or four of them.
Being a domestic goddess, I decided to remedy this situation by buying spoons on Amazon. Just spoons, not flatware set. Plain black teaspoons, how hard could it be, right?
Small problem: most of the teaspoons on Amazon are of foreign make, and their idea of what constitutes a teaspoon isn’t the same as ours.
If at first you don’t succeed…
Third time is the charm, right?
And finally.
My husband has banned me from purchasing additional teaspoons. Instead we jointly bought a new set from Wayfair.
I’ll let you know if it has the proper teaspoons in it.
Think of all those Saturday recipes calling for a teaspoon of this or a teaspoon of that. I see a problem now.
I recommend used syores and antique shops or even garage sales. You can get actual silver for a decent price.
ditto, that is where I got mine for the office
We had the same problem our teaspoons just disappeared so we went out and bought some more and now the knives are doing the same thing!
There must be a cutlery gremlin!!
Quite possibly they have gone wherever the lost socks go…
Ours generally went to the kids’ secret hideouts in the crawlspaces under the roof. Now the kids are older, and missing cutlery can be found in their cars.
Ha ha ha
I found all my missing tableware in my son’s bedroom. He’s pretty good at getting the plates and bowls back to the kitchen, but for some reason, misses the silverware and glasses. When the kids were very little, my spoons made their way out to the dirt pile and kids’ sand box. I still occasionally find a dirt-encrusted yucky old spoon when I’m digging in the garden.
I found my 4year old throwing the spoons in the trash.
Ha ha! Omg, I would be ripping my hair out. The richest man in the world can’t get teaspoons right for sale. *snicker*
The teaspoon became the default spoon for eating and grew along with the dinner plates. Which is possibly part of the reason cooking developed a standardized set?
I think #4 on far right is for demitasse.
Enjoy your new set in good health for many years to come. Leave the remaing pieces of your original for outdoor use.
Also, the teaspoon and tablespoon called for in recipies is almost never the same as tablewear. When it matters, use calibrated spoons.
It said coffee/tea spoon. 🙁
Those look short to me. Like a sugar spoon, and then a table spoon or normal sized spoon. Our teaspoons can be used in tall glasses to stir the iced tea. 🙂
They’re long and slender.
Yes, but do they hold 5ml?
I have the long, slender teaspoons from a restaurant supply store (I bought them in Tulsa, Oklahoma about 5 years ago) and from my Lenox flatware set. Not sure if either one holds 5 ml. Would have to test it out.
Oops, the name shouldn’t say [redacted – no worries, I’ve got your back. – Ilona]. I’m at work so that was on my mind when I put that there. Yikes!
I always thought a tea spoon was long and slender too.
Ice tea spoons are the long slender ones (at least in my set)
Correct. Teaspoons for hot tea are short. I think Ilona’s concern is the volume. A standard tsp is 5ml. I get around this by having a dedicated set of measuring spoons, from 1/4 teaspoon to 1.5 tablespoon. The teaspoons we generally use at the table are standard, but what my mom always considered a tablespoon turns out to be about 7.5ml. That is half the volume of a standard tablespoon, which should be 15ml. I have just spent several minutes proving my suspicions on this matter correct. 😀
It’s worse than that. 1 tsp seems to generally be 5ml. But I’ve found that a tablespoon can be 15, 20 or 25 mls depending on whether the recipe is US, UK, Australian or New Zealand. And those long handled spoons are called parfait spoons here in NZ, and I just call the tiny ones ‘ cute ‘ 🙂
My problem is the definition of a soup spoon. I don’t know who designed them, but a lot of them are too wide. I’ve been told I have a big mouth, but most soup spoons are too wide for it. I guess my mouth must be vertically tall, which is the direct opposite of my body type. My feeling is that a spoon should not scrape the sides of my mouth as it goes in.
I end up having to use a standard (table) spoon instead of a soup spoon. Which means if I’m at a restaurant that I usually find myself short a spoon by the end of the meal.
That is because soup spoons are to be sipped from the side, not put in the mouth. Soup spoon should be used to scoop soup away from the dinner, not towards them. Sorry, English pedantry with table manners!
Doesn’t matter, it will probably end up on my front anyway. My family usually marvels when I escape a restaurant without spilling.
“Any day I don’t spill food on my tits is a good day.” read this somewhere and it resonates. And what’s with putting a napkin on your lap? Food has to get past the tits AND belly to make it that far (sigh).
☝️
This right here.
( • )( • )
#TeamCeramicSpoons #AndBowlsYouSipFrom #AndChopsticks
(I mean, yes, I know, but, bleh.)
wow…thanks, I always wondered why the soup spoons were so big.
Yeah, I didn’t know you were supposed to use them sideways either. That actually does make more sense. Guess I’m just one of those heathen colonials who never learned proper table etiquette.
Ergh. I associate it with consomme served in a soup plate. (…and then with my father try to get me to learn under what circumstances I should change hands for cutting my meat, and which ones I shouldn’t.)
Can haz stew and bread, plz?
For some reason, people tend to drop teaspoons into their pockets; perhaps thinking they’ll use them again later and then forgetting. I have caught my brother in law doing this several times-once with my silver. And I agree with the person who said they have a harder time getting brought back by kids who’ve taken them into their bedrooms.
These are my OG teaspoons and they vanish like unattended cash. I think something in my house eats them.
Maybe they’re hanging out with that one sock that disappears when you do laundry.
Teaspoons are useless. You can’t even get a good scoop of soup out of them. And you can’t use them in cooking. Just good for stirring I guess.
True, but they have a great ability to enable self-justification when eating ice cream directly from the carton – it was just a couple of teaspoons!
Well, they are teaspoons, meant to be used to stir milk into one’s tea. A soup spoon is an enterily different animal.
Depends on the set. My teaspoons are… substantial. My soup spoons make decent serving spoons.
Teaspoons are excellent for feeding small children. (Bring on the W.C. Fields jokes, I know.) Other than that, they are best used for…tea.
Scooping out jam, mustard, honey- any and all small serving liquid and viscous substances. And stirring. And eating desserts, unless you are in a country that uses cake forks lol.
Maybe it was Beak. Your teaspoon looks like a demitasse. Last time I saw one was at a very upscale restaurant. Hadn’t seen one before that since my grandmothers silver tea set. Typical teaspoons hold between 3 and 7 ml because apparently standardized cutlery is so last year. Designers do like to mess with things. Good luck on the new set!
Is this you, Mud? I thought about Beak LOL {Robyn btw}
I really like the copper one.
Time to start frisking the kids before they leave the house…………..! ?
… and I hate sticking my hand down the disposal to check…
You made me curious! My teaspoons, from a very inexpensive set purchased many years ago who remembers where, actually do hold 5cc. I’m a veterinarian, so I have syringes to scientifically satisfy my curiosity.
Same problem in our house. Every category of flatware is equally represented except teaspoons. I’ve noticed this for a while. We had extras, but they still go off in vanished-teaspoon-land. Our flatware is at least twenty years old so I doubt I could match it. I’ve decided to go bohemian and not pay attention to pattern. I’m going to buy some random spoons to fill in. I can’t explain this, I suppose we use the spoons more than anything else, but that doesn’t explain the disappearing act.
Sorry, have to ask: I learned cutlery, never heard or read flatware before. Are cutlery and flatware different words for the same thing, or do the words have different meanings?
I believe they are different words for the same thing. As opposed to “silverware” which refers to flatware that is made of sterling silver.
Cutlery generally refers to bladed tools. Flatware is use for what used to be called silverware before silverware became more rare. I have seen cutlery used the same as flatware, just proving that English still is a living language.
In my neck of the woods, i.e. Houston, “silverware” is a generic term for eating utensils of all compositions. My thought on the term is that it refers to the color of the implements rather than the metal composition. Stainless steel is the most common material these days and is (usually) silver colored.
Plasticware is an off-shoot for those who wish to be accurate. I know that other colors of metal are readily available and becoming more common, but so far the “main ingredient” is steel.
Real silver is less common. You will very seldom see it in use – because no one wants to hand wash it. I know I am too lazy to get out my grandmother’s silver and polish it, hand wash it, use it once, and hand wash it again…
Sterling silver very happily washes in the dishwasher, so long as it does not physically touch stainless steel (though the patina will disappear along with the dirt). That’s what I do with mine instead of polishing it by hand. Silverplate will eventually wear off if regularly washed in the dishwasher. Hand-painted china, or pattens with gold/silver/platinum trim should be handwashed, but all other china can be washed in the dishwasher.
“Silverware” is the American term for eating utensils; in British English it’s “cutlery”. “Cutlery” means kitchen knives, because English is a confusing language. 😉
Also British tablespoons are those large serving spoons, whereas American tablespoons are 15 ml soup spoons. I discovered this when an English friend made one of my recipes calling for “6 tablespoons of soy sauce.”
Anything I might add to this would be superfluous, so I won’t. I learned quite a bit actually with all the extra posts!
Those are coffee spoons (I’m Dutch so I’m translating this literally, it may be called different in English). There’s a difference in size. Coffee spoons are about twice the volume in liquid capacity compared to tea spoons. I don’t know if it works in the US, but I suggest buying second hand. Old sets have better size, and usually they are actually better quality as well. For some reason most new cuttlery sets have coffee spoons, either people stopped drinking tea, or people want everything to be bigger.
Yes. Styles change, and it becomes harder and harder to match things like this. In US the larger sizes are due to the increasing palate size. Also, cheaper sets seem to get smaller, so even that isn’t a for sure thing. But on the other hand, if you buy from a company selling patterns that sell open stock on proprietary patterns that they have been selling for decades, those don’t shift in size. That’s why my mom recommended to my sisters and I to get those types of patterns. Because while they are a bit pricey, and rather staid style wise, they can be added to at need.
Huh. In my house it’s forks.
+1
In my house it’s also the forks! When we get down to the last four, off to Salvation Army or Good Will or even the local Junior League.
I think teaspoons have an odd affinity for ether. As in, they just vanish into the ether when their time is come and float there, suspended in isolation never to be found again.
In reality they’re probably tucked away in odd spaces, down the back/sides of the couch or accidentally tossed in the garage
For two years I have had a fork gremlin working to empty all my dinner forks. Then, my salad forks, now it is getting my teaspoons. I thought I was the only one. Maybe all of the flatware has decided to join the alternate universe where socks have been disappearing.
I’m guessing all your missing teaspoons will reappear as Tupperware lids that don’t fit anything.
hahahahaha
LOL!
Ah, new meaning to measuring out your days with coffee (eh hem, TEA) spoons.
P.s. I don’t know why it has taken me so long to get around to the Innkeeper series (I’ve been a faithful reader for years), but I’ve devoured them this past week. Thank you again for sharing your wonderful worlds with us!
I curre. If have plenty of both sizes of spoons but only 3 forks total. Three. I have searched the house and they’ve completely disappeared. I have relented and am going to buy more on payday.
I hate autocorrect. That’s “I currently have…”
Look in the car. My husband cleaned out my daughter’s ancient thirdhand car, which finally kicked the bucket, after she had already gone through it. She missed the console, which was stuffed to the gills, including three dinner forks.
I thought the dishwasher ate teaspoons. But I haven’t used it for quite some time as I live alone, and the teaspoons somehow disappear. But I drink a lot of tea, in the patio and the kitchen.
Ilona I laughed so hard at this post! We have three daughters and use teaspoons frequently. We have also been wondering what was happening as our teaspoon supply has been dwindling dramatically until my husband caught our 2 year old throwing her spoon out with her yogurt container! So now we know why. ???♀️? i love the black utensils though i never knew such a thing existed!
I’m pretty sure that’s what happens at my house. Unfortunately I can’t blame it on the kids…just very spacy moments. I’ve also realized, and had to dig through the trash to find, that I closed up with the fork or spoon inside the takeout container!
Black
copper/rose gold
brass/yellow gold cutlery is in style at the moment.
In Australia at least 🙂
I just needed extra forks for parties and got a pack of just forks at Walmart. They had teaspoons too.
I just bought new sets on Saturday for the same reason. Where do the spoons go? I have 14 people to serve Thanksgiving at my housenext week, I only had 5 spoons. So I just bought two new sets. Now I have 16 spoons.
You will have 13 by the end of the weekend. If you’re lucky.
I remember a pharmacist friend getting me some cough medicine from his store and then showing me three ‘teaspoons’ and asking me which one was the correct size for the medicine. I think he was a bit put out when I actually got it right! It was the size I’d grown up with for teaspoons.
We have a discount shopping center nearby. It includes an Oneida store so its a great place to stock up on teaspoons or any other flatware piece you may be short on. If you like Oneida.
Oops called “Factory Outlet” store.
Big Lots also has a very large collection of Oneida tableware sets. They don’t have my pattern…but that’s 45 years old so I don’t think I’ll ever find that. When we took our family to visit FL (many years ago) we found that the cheap tableware was less expensive than the plastic disposables. Table knives, forks and teaspoons….still have that set…except now we’re down to only 2 spoons.
I love your placemat!
It’s my forks that have all run away to join the Circus, but I sympathise.
I also have been operating under the mistaken assumption that American teaspoons were the long ones used for ice tea and the ones you’re after are the ones we have here in Europe. But I had no idea all the other diversity existed!
There are sites for replacing pieces of sets – ebay can also be good for this kind of thing. I realize actually matching might be more than what you’re aiming for – but if you get real teaspoons from a real set, they’re probably something like the right size?
Once upon a time, in a fit of “…and fix it right!” I made sure I had matching everything for twenty. (And then immediately ended up seating twenty-four. Le sigh.) These days, I have flatware for four. And tableware for… um, well, four, in theory, but I have a bit of a handmade pottery problem the way some people have a drinking problem, so… It’s easier going than my previous fruit tree problem? I also have a small but vital collection of titanium spoons. (The zendo has their own flatware and table, though people raid mine all the time.)
Omg handmade pottery! I would ? to have my own tableware, it must feel so satisfying.
Although my major addiction is huge Italian salad bowls (like half a meter in diameter) so there would be just piles and piles of those.
At the moment I only have a few pieces I’ve made myself.* But everything is made by people I know, either from back home, local to me here, or a few gifts from friends. My set is from https://cascadiastoneware.com/ (with a few pieces from their predecessors, Mud In Your Eye) – but each setting is a different glaze pattern, so there’s room to expand? And then there are my tea bowls. And rice bowls. And mugs…
One of my friends from the farmers market made me a dark red salad bowl I think you’d approve of 🙂 (I’m trying to keep my magpie tendencies in check my limiting them to functional items, but…)
* Though! a) I recently discovered that my sister saved one of the cups from a porcelain tea set I made absolute ages ago. Each cup was a different animal – the one she has has a black cat curled around the bowl of the cup, supporting it. and b) it turns out there is a ceramic co-op nearby, which would cut down on the set up of doing ceramics. (And keep me from trying to use a kiln as an annealing oven so I can blow borosilicate tea bowls. I learned some glass blowing a few years back, but it turns out for my purposes I really want boro…)
I’m another one that likes pottery. My usual flatware is handmade stainless steel that I bought in England but I have another set for relatives who don’t like its heavy weight. And yes the “teaspoon” is large but I don’t remember if they called it a teaspoon.
…you don’t have pictures of your flatware, do you? I’m in early contemplation of figuring out a set more purposefully, and that sounds cool. (I suspect I’m going to collect a few pieces of antique silver to supplement what I got from a great-great grand aunt, but… not really my general look, considering they didn’t put demons on everything.)
Mine is a present from my mother. Right after I left my ex, and moved to the housebarge, I was looking for some that would work with my emerging set of dishes. My mom found these large-ish, stainless steel pieces with handles finished to look like wrought iron… probably not what I would have chosen, but they work well enough? They’re plain, and I like the weight, anyway, even if the faux wrought iron thing isn’t quite my style. (Apparently she wasn’t sure, so she stopped a man about my age she liked the look of, and asked whether he thought I’d like them, and they had a whole discussion about me, her takeaway being that he was interested in her description of me. Oh, yeah, and he thought I’d like them. ?? I don’t know if knowing my mother makes this make more sense or not. *twitch*)
Here’s the link to the place setting that I bought. Hmm, I forgot about the smallest spoons. https://www.culinaryconcepts.co.uk/dining/cutlery/by-place-setting/leaf-7-piece-place-setting
Oh, I love them! And that site…!
(Actually, the unpolished twist neck set if very like what I have now, but without the twist.)
I love borosilicate! (aka “lab glass” – Alas, Pyrex no longer uses it.)
It makes fabulous millefiori style glass jewelry, too…
I used to have a picture from one of the handmade glass jewelry artists. It was his workbench, with $10K worth of borosilicate rods sorted into tubes of various colors stored underneath. It looked almost like honeycomb.
Pyrex doesn’t use it in their kitchen products – if you don’t mind lab products, there’s still boro available 🙂 (I keep meaning to get actual measuring spoons, but until then, well, there is the designated kitchen graduated pipette…)
The studio where I learned artglass glass blowing (as opposed to lab glass glassblowing) is all soda glass – which makes perfect sense, but I got to loving the look of it, and really wanted to do some boro chawan. And it’s all doable, but it’s a *lot* of project, so I pretty much decided to table it. (Though now that I’m going to be with the robot lab… Fabineer and I were just talking about different forge designs, and there’s a lot of overlap. Not that I don’t have plenty of things to put in my life, if I do get a life.)
Speaking of blown lab glass, are you familiar with Acme Klein Bottles (http://kleinbottle.com)?
Not those in particular, no 🙂
It can drive you nuts. About a dozen years ago I tried to finish out a set of silver from my Grandmother. Ordered the same pattern, we thought from the same maker and they were all about an inch to an inch and 1/2 shorter over all. So disappointing. Decided it was not worth searching them out.
For what ever reason, some of the old patterns have a Luncheon size and a Dinner size. I deliberately picked my Mom’s sterling pattern when I got married, and then found out that what I got was the dinner and she had the luncheon! So crazy. Oh well, each of the kids now has a set, and they live in different states.
It sounds a lot like the dryer sock thief. Two socks go in and one comes out.
Glad you feel better. Peace light and love ?K
The first time we replaced our dryer motor, we found $50+ in change, a few dollar bills and many, many socks. No spoons. Go figure.
I think I know why you had to replace your dryer motor.
LOL
+1
Hahahaha I do feel your pain!! I am down to 3. I don’t understand it. Everything else is there!!
Hahaha! I literally just got my new set (of 12 at Costco) put up in my silverware drawer this week. I was down to 5 teaspoons and down a few salad forks too. I have gotten to where, now, I won’t let anyone else clean plates into the trash so that if they go missing again – at least I’ll know who the culprit is and can be frustrated at myself and not the cosmos. Enjoy it while it lasts. 🙂
I would have just looked on ebay.
It is well known that teaspoons are the larval form of the metal coat hangers which multiply within wardrobes as the tea spoons disappear.
This always used to happen at work where it was frequently necessary to purchase more.
This makes *so much* sense!
Thanks for laugh (although I feel your pain) – it was needed today.
Illona there is that great shopping area across the hiway 35, San marcos, that has several shops that sell silverware in pieces or sets. I think that one of them is a Lennox shop but could be wrong.
ROFLOL Thank you, thank you. I am so glad that I’m not the only one who has problems with on-line ordering. Truly sorry for your particularly frustrating issue but it made for a humorous read and I really needed a good laugh today. (Car troubles) Also impressed with your persistence as well as knowing when to go to Plan B. Again, thank you for sharing.
No…those are the teaspoons we have in England. Good lord, how small are yours? Like how many teaspoons of sugar do you have to put in before you’ve got the equivalent of a cube?
First a lack of kettles, now abnormally small teaspoons. What happened, America?
On the loss of spoons though, today at work I was given a secret teaspoon to hoarde by someone who knows I have a secret stash of tea. Both are gold dust in the office kitchen. As are forks. Far too many people are making cuppas with knives.
We have lost forks. We are OVERRUN with spoons. Mostly enormous tablespoons that we use less often. But our fork shortage is becoming an issue. :-/
Good spoon thoughts to you and yours!
Oh dear… And I do realize that you have already made decisions, but I was reminded that I used to solve various kitchen problems in restaurant supply stores. (Department of “Fix it but good” once again. Hey, I used to have three ovens, and my family had the habit of showing up at my house and expecting to be able to start stuffing their faces. Okay, yeah, I totally miss that part.)
I figured there would be a web equivalent, and lo –
https://www.webstaurantstore.com/51001/spoons.html
(Note that in most cases size is explicitly listed. Though I didn’t check if they only do wholesale. Hey, you all have a business license, right?)
Cool site! I love supply stores. 🙂
I was alright until the picture with the smallest spoon at the end and then I couldn’t stop laughing. Sorry. In my house it’s teaspoons too. Currently I have two. I’m putting off buying more because it’s not that long ago that I last replaced them all. Where. Do. They. Go??? I mean they’re not edible. Do the knives and forks get together and wage war on them and then hide the bodies? They don’t go to Sockri-la because the portal to that is through the tumble dryer and I have said (sadly more times than I wish to admit) that cutlery does not go in the tumble dryer.
A neighbor, who had just moved from a foreign country, asked my mom what a teaspoon was. My mom, who was raised in a formal household, went on for some length about the different kinds of flatware used in formal dining, including teaspoons, ice-tea spoons, desert spoons, soup spoons, and sugar spoons. Eventually the neighbor asked, “So, in this recipe, when it says ‘tablespoon,’ do I use the soup spoon?”
[In the US, “teaspoon” could be either a small spoon for stirring a cup of tea or a 5 ml measuring utensil for cooking. They are not the same thing. A “tablespoon” is a 15 ml measuring utensil.]
Not a solution, but I read this article recently in which researchers did a study on missing teaspoons in the workplace. Found it quite interesting and amusing.
https://theconversation.com/the-curious-case-of-the-missing-workplace-teaspoons-103989
That was very nicely done, right up until the last line. That’s how spoons end up in the dryer.
That was very nicely done, right up until the last line. That’s how spoons end up in the dryer.
Too funny. One of my co-workers teaches nursing research, so I sent the link on to her!
That’s hilarious bc it didn’t happen to me. If it did my head would probably explode. Lol maybe measure w a ruler to try to get the length rightish??
The discussion spawned by the missing teaspoon post is fabulous. Ilona, I hope you use the flavor of these replies to create a situation in one of the Innkeeper books…. wouldn’t the mystery of the missing spoons be interesting?
Now you have enough soup spoons for any future emergency! Zombie apocalypse and all we have is cans of food type of situation.
Be SURE you have a can opener!
We have the same problem with teaspoon sizes. I think its a US thing, to get an actual tsp I have to use a dedicated measuring spoons.
Also I don’t have a disappearing spoons we have multiplying knives… we ordered a set of 12 of everything when we moved in to our place years ago. we now have 17 knives. they all look the same. No idea how that happened.
Lmao. We have the same issue with disappearing silverware. They’ve gotten to be like socks. At least we know the dryer eats those. Idk where the heck my spoons and forks go though, I think I have a monster somewhere that eats them. Good luck with wayfair!
Lmao. We have the same issue with disappearing silverware. They’ve gotten to be like socks. At least we know the dryer eats those. Idk where the heck my spoons and forks go though, I think I have a monster somewhere that eats them. Good luck with wayfair!
I laughed so hard. I have disappearing cake forks. They’ve either been taken be pixies, or are in a pocket universe.
I had the same issue with teaspoons. My original set had twice as many teaspoons as forks and knives. One day I realized I had half as many teaspoons as forks. I knew the make and model, so tried to get replacements on-line. Discovered they were discontinued and cost several dollars each to replace. So just like you, we have new silverware now!
I had this problem, so on Amazon they had cheap spoons and they looked fine. Bought them and the handle was too short. They were listed as “Libbey Just Tasting Appetizer Spoon, 12-Piece by Libbey
Size: A
Twelve stainless steel appetizers spoons
Made of 18/10 stainless steel
Great wedding, housewarming or host gift
Dishwasher safe
Made in China
Just saying. ?
BUT, the box itself was labeled “Demitasse Spoons”
Even the Neo knows, that “there is no spoon”. XDD
What spoon?
+1
When I was a kid, the spoons were in the sandbox. Later the forks were with the dirty plates under the bed. As a childless adult, I second the pixie theory
Mine is the dinner forks… I have 12 (originally) of every thing. So one day I am setting the table and expecting company and realize I only have 8 dinner forks but twelve of all else. I buy replacement sets… no single issues for my utensils… so the other day I am preparing for a meal with family… I have 16 dinner knives, 16 dinner spoons, 16 teaspoons, and 16 salad forks, and 9 dinner forks… 9 .. where did they go? Hmmmm. Things that make you shake your head and our another glass of wine.
Same here! What happens to make my forks…um… Fork off?!
Senn Maud lately? Any increase in ER visits involving throat wounds?
Sympathized & lmao In the same breath.
We rotated thru different utensils (in response to my pitching a fit on…). I finally nipped the problem by getting out my silver. My husband bought extra silver forks, then individually informed each member of the house (children) the replacement costs.!! Two years ago ?
Good job! ?
The missing teaspoons aren’t me.
I bring my own.
?
When I was little (under 5), whenever I ate a yoghurt I would throw out the tub with the spoon still in it. Took my mum a while to notice they were going missing. I never confessed lol
My sons done that as well, I also think that the dishwasher eats them but only the good ones.
This has happened to me as well. It must be the pixies lol.
I got replacement teaspoons that were actually teaspoons at kohl’s.com. Very reasonably priced and again actually teaspoons.
LOL too funny! The original teaspoons are in the safe place with your rings 😉
Then the question always becomes, are you talking about teaspoons, or tea spoons (i.e. iced tea spoons). I have given up on life and when we hit this point we just look for a whole new set. It is particularly onerous because we are high falutin and prefer to have ALL the kinds of spoons, teaspoons, tea spoons, tablespoons, and soup spoons.
The bowl/head of Ilona’s original black spoon photo – initially reminded me of a jam spoon.
I am compelled to comment that it’s nice to see another Gina G. Iam also now compelled to go eat some jam. Mmmmm
I have a thing for long-handled iced tea (or ice scream) spoons. But I’m really particular about length and bowl design. I like a small, shallow bowl…almost flat. My favorites were purchased back in 2004 from Crate & Barrel. I’m constantly prowling the internet, hoping to find something comparable. So far, no joy. #theweirdthingsweobsessabout
Check out Oneida. I ended up with my Mom’s this year and that is the maker and they have a shallow bowl. My husband didn’t think people would use them but I put them on the counter and they get used all the time.
When DH and I got married, we got a set of stainless flatware that I really liked. They were on close out, so score on the price, right? Except just try to get replacements. They aren’t made anymore.
To the webs I went, riding my charger and ready to do battle to acquire the spoons that matched my set! Alas, anyone selling this same style of flatware isn’t going to just sell you the teaspoons. You must buy the whole lot of whatever they have to get the teaspoons. So now, I have just barely enough teaspoons, but I have a bounteous bunch of extra soup spoons, I’m overflowing with butter knives, and oy, do I ever have tons of forks.
So, anyway, that’s an option.
OK, here is what I was taught, probably in Home Ec class 100 years ago. Silverware/flatware is named for their purpose. They are NOT measuring spoons, they are named according to their purpose. MEASURING spoons are the only ones that will give you the exact volume indicated. Silverware may be close, with the emphasis on “maybe” and “close”. I don’t know if the same is true for non-US utensils, so it may be a US thing. I learned to cook pretty by the “pour it in until it looks like the right amount” method, but when an exact measurement is needed, I was taught to only use a measuring spoon, not silverware.
Analytical balance or go home.
?
At my house I solved this problem by searching out “demitasse” spoons. There are several styles at Crate & Barrel (which just so happens to be right across the street from Barnes and Noble at Bridgeport…)
LOL
There is no spoon. /zen
Once upon a time, I lived in a student apartment complex in another country. Dishes were provided, but not in a logical manner. We had 4 people in our apartment, 4 forks, twelve butter knives, four soup bowls, seven plates, five pots, one large skillet, a teapot, and three spoons.
Other apartments had similar situations. You have never seen so many otherwise rational and laid-back individuals become so obsessively possessive of silverware. My spoon lived in my bedroom with me and was locked up with my computer during the day. One of my friends had six spoons in his apartment, so at any given gathering, his two favorite and most trusted guests would be allocated a spoon. Everyone else was BYOS.
Spoons are serious business.
BYOS rotfl.
The ridiculousness of this, reminds me of otgher ridiculous hijinks.
I had an aunt, that every time i saw her she gave me a box of plates and silverware. I had my own compkete set already, she was giving me more and more and more of her old brown ceramic dishes from the 60s, until I quietly donated 5 sets worth to goodwill when I graduated.
Try replacements.com if you know the manufacturer and style of your flatware. They will sell in sets, but also open stock. I have a 45 yo set of Oneida stainless and use them to replace missing and damaged pieces. (The garbage disposal eats mine, especially spoons.)
I highly recommend Replacements.com. I’ve been a fan and customer since the 1990s, after I faxed them photos of my my maternal great-grandmother’s German sterling flatware, and the visually similar silverplate. They told me the pattern name and the manufacturer, promising to let me know if they ever got any in. Since then I’ve registered my paternal grandmother’s silverplate pattern, my sterling and everyday stainless steel patterns, and the china patterns belonging to my mother, sister (that she found at a garage sale), and me. As various pieces have gone on sale I’ve bought fill-in pieces for all of us.
With identification information from them, it’s easy to comparison shop on eBay, which sometimes has the same pieces…
They are the greatest, and are a wonderfully humane employer. I prefer mismatched and love buying random odds/ends from them.
Thank you – had never heard of these guys and they have a set of long ago discontinued crystal glasses that we were down to two only of. Much appreciated.
For me, teaspoons are those that are a small bowl with a very long handle, suitable for stirring iced tea in tall glasses. The one you seem to want, we have always called dessert spoons.
Look in your sock drawer! You will likely see a bunch of extra socks there that were transformed by mischevious gremlins!
We had the same experience 4-5 years ago. I decided to get another set and the “teaspoon” was the size of our original set’s soup spoon and the soup spoon was almost as big as the serving spoon. Unless your set is still being made, these are the spoon sizes in current off the shelf sets. They seem to be designed for giants. I don’t know if this is a U.S thing or just a general “bigger is better” design philosophy in houseware.
My husband did a saved search on eBay and was able to find another set of our silverware. And yes, we have a lot of extra everything else now which works out when we host extended family functions.
Make sure you check the cosmetics bag and toiletries bag. Oh, and the car. I found two that way. No idea what they were doing in the toiletry travel bag.
I count our silverware after every meal… because of my sister; or maybe because of my mother. My sister had a terrible tendency to dump utensils in the trash when scrapping plates. Mom was pretty patient with her until some of the sterling flatware disappeared. From then on we counted and I’m not out of the habit. It has saved quite a few pieces…and annoyed a few teens who have had to go dumpster diving. ?
I’ve done dumpster diving for retainers, but not silverware.
+1 Not sure whether it’s good or bad we never found the dratted thing. That dumpster was nasty.
We started losing teaspoons when my husband changed from fast food lunches to brown bag lunches. He swore up and down he brought back every spoon.
So I bought a cheep set of spoons and forks at a discount store. He was allowed to use only those for his lunches.
Picture my shock when I had to buy him a new set after a while!
I’m sure my good ones are deep in a landfill.
Luckily I can get replacements on eBay.
I have the same problem. After 30+ years with the set, which I still love, the teaspoons have gone missing. I go to Replacements, Ltd (www.replacements.com). They buy discontinued stock from manufacturers & stores and sell the pieces individually. It’s not necessarily cheap (my teaspoons are ~$25 a piece), but they match (the important part!).
I’m pretty cheap so always just go to a thrift store and buy a bunch of teaspoons whenever they disappear (I think the gnomes take them)
If you have a Bed Bath and Beyond near by, you can by individual pieces of flatware by Gourmet Settings (at least at my 2 BB&B). I use these and they are pretty nice quality (18/10 I think). You’re right, where do the spoons go? I’ve bought many!
Same. Finally just bought cheapie Wal-Mart and it broke in my mouth. Gave up and got full freaking set from Macy’s. All I can think of is the borrowers.
We have the opposite problem, we have all of our flatware, forks, knives, spoons, etc with a patterned handle, one day I was putting away dishes and found a spoon that was very clearly not part of the set. All my spoons, forks, were accounted for. This happens occasionally, no idea where the extra’s are coming from…are people coming over for dinner and bringing their own silverware and then leaving it? Are we going to a friends house or restaurants and eating and then sticking silverware in my purse? Where does it come from?
OMG I have the same problem!!I only have 4 teaspoons and 8 of everything else!
My stainless flatware set had 24 teaspoons + 6 as an added bonus. That was four years ago. I now have seven – that is 7 – teaspoons. I am going to try Walmart. Maybe they will have teaspoons. Now I just have to brave the parking lot. Maybe tomorrow. Or maybe when I run out of teaspoons.
I had missing forks. I googled the name and found identical ones on eBay. And yes, they were identical. Worth a try.
The only time I hit the dollar store with dedication,,, I go through teaspoons like other folks go through socks. If I’m going to, “misplace,” them anyway, I’ll buy them as cheap as I can.
I finally was reduced to going to Walmart and buying loose spoons there. Have no idea where all the others went. Dishwasher maybe?? Hiding with the socks? Still looking for my other slipper. Ah well, back to Walmart (sigh)
If you know your pattern try Replacements, Ltd. on line. If they don’t have it in stock you can have them search, and you can just order what you are missing!
Congratulations on your book ranking. In our house, we have decided that the dogs eat the teaspoons at night while we sleep. Walmart is the place where I have found packs of teaspoons. Happy spoon hunting.
Still? Had the same problem and it drove me nuts. Went to Wal-Mart and bought two packages of cheap teaspoons, set them in a cup on the counter by the tea and coffe maker, and it solved the problem. They were used for all kinds of stuff as they were easy to reach. If enough ran away with the dish, I just went and got more (and I fiercely guarded my good teaspoons!) I hate buying stuff like that online when I can’t see see and feel it.
OMG, LOL, AHAHAHA. The demitasse spoon floored me, I’m crying 😀
LOL.
I went to Germany this year and was fascinated with the adorable little spoons they served with coffee. I seriously contemplated liberating them from every restaurant but instead found myself in a Woolworth and bought a sleeve of them. Aaannddd my 5 year old found them and uses them exclusively now so I expect they’ll walk off permanently before too much longer.
bawhahahahaha. . . I SO needed to laugh – not at your or the teaspoon dilemma …just a laugh ~~ thanks.
I’ve tried to get replacement teaspoons for my stainless pattern that is no longer being sold. It’s available thru the replacements website, however teaspoons seem to be the most requested item. They have some, if I want to spend $37.50 EACH.
Nope.
Maybe it’s a regional thing, but I’ve never heard of the small spoons being called ‘teaspoons’. We call the large spoons ‘soup spoons’, and the smaller spoons… well small spoons or dessert spoons. I don’t know if I’m the odd one out, or if ‘teaspoon’ is a regional term, and therefore not all small spoons are sold as ‘teaspoons’ ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
My mom went through the same issue two years ago, but didn’t try to find replacements from her old set… they just started looking at new sets… but my Dad hates soup spoons, he wants small (and he means small) teaspoons to eat with. No big manly bites for him. After 1 month of rejecting every set he looked at, Mom asked me… so I drug her to Tuesday Morning where we had him meet us… he rejected three more sets before spotting the dainty Oneida Savor teaspoons and he was satisfied… they were sold individually. So they bought 10 of each, he complained about buying the tablespoons, but Mom put her foot down (she wanted them for soup), salad and dinner forks, too.
Later, they were having trouble with my grandmother choking on too big bites using the soup spoons, and I found Savor baby spoons (and long beverage and actual round soup spoons, and butter knives as Christmas gifts) for Mawmaw to use. Dad now prefers the baby spoons, and when theyou are all in the wash, he uses my beverage spoons even while he complains about the long skinny handles.
She still grumbles about her lost spoons, because she had the matching serving set. I always point out that her favorite serving spoon is actually not part of that set, so it shouldn’t matter. Besides, my grandmother (the other one, who takes great delight in setting the table), always uses mismatched silverware from the drawer…
I have bought American size teaspoons by the spoon from BigLots if you have one nearby. About $1 per spoon. I really like the big Serving spoons also!
It looks like you want what’s called a European or Euro teaspoon. They range from 5 1/4 to 5 3/4 inches, whereas regular teaspoons are more 6 1/4 to 6 3/4. (There are also even smaller ones (4 1/4 to 4 3/4) called demitasse or A.D. coffee spoons.)
Manufacturers seem to have started discontinuing them, because they’ve been getting harder to find over the past few years. Replacements.com would have them, eBay would have them, Amazon lists a few under “Euro teaspoon” but none under “European teaspoon”.
Restaurant supply websites (such as rwsmithco.com, restaurantequipmentsolutions.com, and instawares.com) have a better selection of new ones and will sell to you even if you aren’t a restaurant. Just make sure to check the actual length of the spoon, which should be included in the listing, and be careful not to get silverplated when you wanted stainless steel, or three dozen when you only wanted one (or vice versa).
Don’t know if anyone else mentioned it because I skipped to the bottom but Walmart sells teaspoons in groups of 4 wrapped by a price sticker, generally. Whenever I’m low on them, I just go buy a few bundles. Cheap.
We’ve had a problem with disappearing forks. We have plenty of salad forks, but the dinner forks seemed to evaporate. We remedied the problem when we found the perfect sized forks in bulk at Pier 1.
My favorite teaspoons are all long handled. That is the only type I like. I will use the other kind to stir.
My local Good Will has boxes of loose flatware, so I dug through until I found around 8 teaspoons that were close-ish to matching each other.
I go to goodwill for extra teaspoons, also.
I discovered this option as well in the last few months. Very helpful!
Ditto — any thrift store. So what kind of metal, exactly, is black?
What is the link for the gold set 3rd in I ADORE it (poor size of teaspoon to be forgiven – possibly)?
Thank you!!
Good luck with your flatware dilemma. 🙁
At our house it’s the big forks and big spoons. I have found a couple in the trash. No one ever knows how they ended up in there :-/
Beaker started stealing and hiding spoons when she was about 4 months old. She also stole socks. I have gone thru 48 teaspoons. I bought cheap ones, my friends bought rummage ones, and I finally started shopping at Goodwill. I’ve given up. She doesn’t steal serving spoons.
I just wish I knew what she did with them!
Oh my God *dying*
I gave up.
I’m still laughing. I didn’t realize this was a widespread problem. We inherited a “set” of nice flatware, the style is long out of production. For some reason we have knives, and we do have teaspoons. Heck, we even have butter knives. that sort of threw me. I never really considered them basic flatware. However we have two (2) forks. Now forks are basic. It seems that my father in law, a lovely man who should never- ever have been allowed in a kitchen insisted on using the forks to get things out of the garbage disposal. How 4 forks came to the same grisly end has to be a testament to male stubbornness.
Big Lots has boxes of flatware. You can buy a set or just a box of spoons, etc.
Ditto Costco
When I was a kid we would put out paper plates, styrofoam cups and the good silver (service of 36) for our family Christmas Eve dinner with extended family. After the party and the cleanup we would count all the silver. If any pieces were missing we spent Christmas Day going through ever trash bag until we found every piece. Fun times ??
BUT they are very pretty spoons
Teaspoons. Have you looked in all those containers and packets of things that generally only require a tsp in a recipe? Baking powder, dry mustard, the sugar bowl, etc. That’s where my mother leaves all hers. Just a thought.
I’m pretty sure the spoons are hanging out with the rings 😉
In the safest spot EVER (they’re safest when hiding).
Here in Switzerland it is missing ballpoint pens. I hear they all sit on an island in the pacific laughing their socks off.
Nope , my theory is that ballpoint pens are the larval form of clothes hangars. It’s the best reason I can come up with to explain why I have closets full of clothes hangars, but never buy any. I can never find a ballpoint pen, but buy them continually.
Great one! Laughed so hard.
Possible explanation for the missing teaspoons https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1322240/
Awesome!
That is hysterical! Do you read the bibliography?
That is hysterical! Do you read the bibliography?
LOL the Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy lmfao … that is gold!!
On a separate note I am sooooo sooooo sorry Ilona….. I actually laughed out loud when I saw the 4th and tiniest teaspoon.
The first few look like what they do in Australia. I have had a few around over the years that look similar to yours but they always annoyed me because I like to eat my ice-cream with ones the size of the first 3 lol.
Hope the new ones work for you though. thanks for the laughs.
Thank you. At last a scientific study. I had not considered outer space as I was convinced fellow employees were taking and hoarding non plastic teaspoons. My manager refused to authorize GPS. She also would not allow cameras or random locker searches either. Sigh. So I started using petty cash to go buy non plastic teaspoons at dollar store on my way home. Well, they complained about plastic spoons making coffee taste bad and I figured cheap dollar store teaspoons would be MIA soon anyway.
Thanks again, Eva. And yes I did read the bibliography.
(Just sent to the slug lab, with an image of the Tick crying “Spoon!”)
Loved it — priceless.
Wish someone would pay me to do this survey . I would simply skip to the end and send a memo stating, “We will no longer be supply spoons. Period. Full Stop. BRING YOUR OWN! B.Y.O.S.
I keep collapsible wood and titanium chopsticks, a titanium spoon, and a knife or three in my bag. Often a spare spoon. (Which is carefully cleaned after being loaned out. And I know which is which – I don’t like the texture of shape of the bowl of the spare nearly as much.) Okay, and a rolled up silicone tea bowl.
I hate disposable eating implements, and I eat in my office a lot. And I’ve never quite gotten it out of my system that one must have the essential gear on one’s person at all times. (Bah. I wonder if my new lab mates are going to try to steal my flatware and set it on fire? I haven’t had to worry about that for a bit.)
I live the article thanks for sharing- plus the saga of the spoons a great end to finishing Diamond Fire and then getting caught up on catching up on blogs when i should be asleep for work in the morning 🙂
I don’t use teaspoons, don’t take sugar or milk and don’t drink instant coffee so it’s not me.
I don’t use teaspoons, don’t take sugar or milk and don’t drink instant coffee so it’s not me. Love the bibliography.
Hmmm. Soup spoon, soup spoon with shorter handle (I absolutely hate how companies do that. Cheap!) Same spoon in different plating, a *real* teaspoon, and a demi-tasse spoon (for coffee). I feel your pain, and wish you luck getting more of the correct spoons. Can you contact the manufacturer or whoever put out the set? Maybe they’ll sell you dozen.
It irritates the heck out of me that it’s so expensive to buy just spoons. I know perfectly well that my boys tossed them along with their yogurt cups. I accept it. But should it really be more expensive to replace the spoons than to replace the whole darned set?
And yes, I admit, I have an issue with stuff matching, but geeze, gimme a break!
I think the kids throw them away lol. I buy packs of teaspoons at Big Lots usually.
Liberty Tabletop is the only flatware company left in the USA. It makes beautiful flatware and has a sample program. It has been written up in the New York Times. It is very high quality
I had this problem with knives and spoons on a 144 piece set. I googled what I could find written on the forks, looked at pictures that came up and found replacements on eBay. It was nice as I have all 36 of the forks.
I have a theory about missing things. Especially those missing single socks, handkerchiefs, biros, teaspoons, hairpins, hair ties, packets of gum, rolls of sticky tape, that favourite lipstick you can no longer find, single earrings, double adaptors, that new phone cable, those extra batteries you bought etcetc.
I think there is a 5th dimension, and it is accessed by the tiny black hole that moves randomly around your house. It always settles under things or at the back of things like drawers and boxes and washing machines and dryers.
And one day it is going to reverse polarities and vomit every missing sock and biro etc last seen on the planet back through its tiny little sucky mouth from that 5th dimension.
All at once.
I reckon all those missing items will raise the land level by quite a few feet.
…this is how we’re going to combat the sea level rise from global warming?
I laughed when I read this comment, but ya know it could work. lol Try not to be close when everything you have lost come vomiting back. Could hurt. One slipper is still MIA and small spoons have stopped disappearing…peering anxiously around..at least I hope so. Time will tell.
I buy small flashlights 3 or 4 at the time (you know the ones that take 3 AAA batteries) at the Dollar Store. My partner had Alzheimer’s and walked off with them, never to be seen again. Had to stop him from helping me put the groceries away because I could never find anything we bought after.
Now that he is content in long term care, am finding stuff all over the place.
I am still looking for stuff that I put in a “safe” place. never to be seen again. My sister has a “safe” place too. Neither of us has a clue where that place is.
Maybe my stuff/sock/slipper is there. Who knows??
When the Wayfair teaspoons dwindle to a small number, maybe a trip to IKEA will set you up. Just ordinary stainless. The main pattern (Dragon) never gets dropped.
Ah, yes, the mystery of missing teaspoons…ours usually end up being somewhere on the floor behind cabinets and other appliances, have found some forks there as well XD
While the shape/design of them are in all kinds (we’ve got like 4 or 5 kinds of different teaspoons) size of them remains roughly the same, may vary by 2 or 3 millimeters, but that’s it.
They need to add the sizes for teaspoons on amazon ;D
I gave up on matching teaspoons to the rest of my flatware and got a “complementary” pattern at a local discounter. Let’s see how long they take to disappear.
My teenager locks his room from the inside, then uses a fork or spoon to open it. He then leaves it on his dresser. Or down the side of his bed. Or in the bathroom so he doesn’t have to carry it in his pocket. About once a week, my mom flips because there is no flatware. I’ve asked him to use butter knives, as no one uses them, but that hasn’t happened. It is a big problem in our house. I hate teenagers.
FWIW, here’s how we solved the problem of accidentally locked bedroom doors:
1) Disable the doorknob lock or replace the knob with a non-lockable version
2) Install a hook-and-eye (https://www.homedepot.com/s/hook%20and%20eye) on the inside.
That way the daughter could escape from her younger brother but she no longer locked herself out.
Yes ikea as an earlier person posted! I went through what you did too and then happened to find the perfect size at ikea.
Why is it that spoons are migratory and other utensils aren’t? It’s a mystery for the ages.
If you know what pattern your silverware set is, you can usually get individual pieces of just about anything from http://www.replacements.com.
+1
I would add a couple of things about Replacements. They will identify your pattern for you. They can ID it based on pictures and shapes. It is fairly cool. They are expensive, however and the scarcity of the pattern drives up the price. They also have a HUGE warehouse which is open to the public and gives tours. It is fairly magical if you have a fondness for old house hold goods. They also buy flat ware, table ware, and gift ware. Their offering price is, of course, lower than what you could make selling it to the person who’s dog stole your the teaspoons in your grandma’s flatware!
Why is it that spoons are migratory and other utensils aren’t? It’s a mystery for the ages.
If you know what pattern your silverware set is, you can usually get individual pieces of just about anything from http://www.replacements.com.
Thank you for the post, Ilona Andrews. The mystery of the missing teaspoons. It happens everywhere. My demented mother used to blow up a microwave around every 3 months. Metal and microwaves are a NO NO. I learned quickly to buy basic microwave only and plastic teaspoons which i put by microwave just for her use. Then she complained about plastic spoons melting in microwave. So I bought microwave safe teaspoons and she complained not true teaspoons…. too big, too small, too narrow…
So after she went to live with my sister I went to Replacements, Inc in McLeansville NC and replaced all my MIA plates, bowls, eating utensils etc.
On a side note, my sister now has no teaspoons. She is unhappy as that was set given to her when she married. So now I stop by dollar store or Big Lots and take a set of teaspoons with me on my monthly visit to Mother to trim latest dog nails, heartworm medicate dog etc so we can have a properly set table for lunch.
Love Replacements.com. Also Oneida.com. They were able to match my daily stainless (we saved Green Stamps to get the set before our wedding mumble-mumble years ago).
I think you have to look for demitasse spoons. They are about half the size of American teaspoons.Your original set must be European.
The smallest spoon you have in the line up looks to be a salt cellar/sugar bowl spoon.
I may be wrong but you might end up having a problem with the Wayfair set as well. They could be the same size as the other teaspoons you lined up to the left of the screen if they are American made.
You can look through Ebay with more luck, I think. You may even be able to find them on the Ebay UK or France ones. Shipment fees may be a little steep , though.
Good luck with your hunt for teaspoons!
I’m confused as to what a proper teaspoon is. All the ones Ilona posted looked fine to me. Now I’m thinking maybe I’m teaspoon deprived and don’t know it?!
The last one seems to be a coffee spoon. Those ar not seen much nowadays where I live.
At my home it’s the slightly bigger size spoons like those in the photos that have gone missing. I’ve tried to find new ones separately without luck. Of course, I have searched for dessert spoons. Maybe I should try with “tea spoons” 🙂
Daiso has the right size tea spoons! Of course, they call them coffee spoons.
Daiso has the right sized teaspoons! Unfortunately, they call me hem coffee spoons.
Is this your manufacturer? Perhaps they have just the spoons available.
https://www.amazon.com/Silverware-Stainless-Flatware-Utensils-Dishwasher/dp/B07C84RGK3/ref=lp_18105938011_1_1?srs=18105938011&ie=UTF8&qid=1542382098&sr=8-1
Next time try an antique store. I had the same problem. Does someone in your house take yogurt for lunch, take a spoon and don’t replace it? That is what happened. The antiques store sold spoons from incomplete wedding sets. So I had a set of mismatched silver spoons that were beautiful, each one for a dollar.
Same!!! My first apartment, I bought new flatware… 1 year later, half the teaspoons were gone. Also 1 fork and 1 knife, but none of the bigger spoons in the set. It drives me batty. Since then, various people have walked off with my teaspoons (all recovered aka I search my sister at the door) and now they are rationed like the precious commodity I was never expecting them to be.
We can never keep up with our long handled iced teaspoons so I just keep picking up a couple every other month at Walmart. (They really do have nice ones.) But, I recently went outside into the backyard wood shop… I found the missing spoons all over the place! It seems “someone” decided long ago that the iced sweet tea wasn’t quite sweet enough and instead of saying anything, a tall cold glass of sweet tea gets extra sugar before heading out to the shop and of course said y’all glass requires a long handled spoon to stir it to dissolve the extra sugar!? I’m just having a hard time understanding how the glasses make it back inside sans spoons!
I just want to know: how on earth does flatware create a flame war? Who are these people?!
What flamewar?
Tylikcat above is afraid that her lab mates are going to flame the flatware she carries with her. I used to think of scientists as quite serious and single-minded people but that image has been driven out of my head into multifaceted, creative, competitive and a bit chaotic. I expect that to be a scientist you must question everything. I want details.
If you’ll kindly check your timestamps, you’ll notice I brought that up after Jen’s comment!
And it’s not an idle concern! The last time I spent a lot of time around roboticists, one of them (one of the various folks who stayed with us in the Woodinville house for a while, part of the GYRE reduced gravity robotics group at the UW*) kept trying to steal my titanium flatware and set it on fire because “titanium burns a really pretty color!” …these are all folks I knew socially through geek circles, back when I was a biochemist, but academic overlap is a thing.
* aka, how a bunch of undergrads came up with an idea in a bar and ended riding the vomit comet – twice! Many of these folks are still among my close friends.
We also have a problem with teaspoons. The third set of cutlery in 43 years was purchased 7 years ago and fortunately is still available. All the teaspoons have been replaced. I think it is time to order some additional spoons. 1 has gone missing.
What is a black spoon? Not a joke, I really don’t know. Thanks.
Oooh, the rooster looks just like my lovely Gold-Laced Wyandotte (currently cowering in the coop because of the snowfall). Three inches last night, and it’s not even December.
Have you read the Elfhome series by Wen Spencer? There is a character in the 3rd book that loses things. I cannot say more without spoilers.
That is an excellent series!?
Literally laughing out loud. Thank you for the laugh!
Thank you for the link to the lost teaspoon study. Our staff Room has a chronic shortage of teaspoons and forks – I have blamed our students, who come with cutlery requiring food and no cutlery! But perhaps it is that other dimension is way more attractive than the hard life of an aid to caffeine deprived Australians.
Dollar Tree, hon. Or Wal-Mart. Seriously. 4 for a dollar (sometimes less at Wal-Mart.) Best of all, you get to hold it in your hand and decide if it is worthy of your dollar before you buy it. (I am, of necessity, super cheap.)
This is nothing new, but an ongoing problem. I remember my mother going to S. S. Kresge’s to find cheap replacement spoons, about 55 years ago! A few years later, the Kresge chain was renamed K-Mart.
There are teaspoons and “tea” spoons with the long grip ice tea. It boggles the mind!
An Australian scientist did a reasearch paper over a decade ago looking into the phenomena of teaspoons going missing from work break rooms. It’s a hilarious read.
https://www.bmj.com/content/331/7531/1498
I think our teaspoons have run away together. I’m missing 5 from a set and every other pattern from that company has the options to purchase singles…except for the set I own (and after pulling a fork from the garbage after my 7 year old fed the cats, I have an idea where my 5 teaspoons went.)
When I was a young kid I saw the guy on TV that claimed he could bend spoons with his mind. At the time I didn’t understand what he was claiming and just thought being able to bend spoons was a big deal. I bent (broke) almost all of our household spoons practicing to prove my greatness.
Hit the thrift store. I get all extra flatware at the thrift as we lose it constantly. It doesn’t match, but if you don’t mind a table setting with character, it’s a great way to go. Re-use and reduce and all that.