L’argenterie royale

~ iamthesunking

Louis Catorze is continuing to enjoy his mix of wet and dry food. However, he still expects the wet food, which is already in small pieces, to be cut up into EVEN SMALLER pieces for him. If we don’t do it he just leaves the food to go dry and gross, and this makes it much harder to clean the bowl.

(And, no, I have no idea how it is that he manages to rip the heads off rodents, yet he can’t bite into a small, soft piece of cooked fish unless humans cut it up for him.)

With this in mind, one of my friends sent Catorze some antique Louis XIV silverware (yes, SILVERWARE, not “cutlery” – merci, Google, for correcting me). What an unbelievably lucky Roi he is.

Oh. Mon. Dieu. Merci, Cathie!

Cat Daddy’s initial reaction: “What the f***? What is wrong with your friends?”

Cat Daddy’s follow-up reaction, upon discovering that Louis XIV silverware is a real thing and not something that I made up: “Ooh. That must be worth a bit!”

Naturellement, being special silverware, we can’t just sling it into the dishwasher alongside our own plebby stainless steel. Care instructions are as follows:

Separate the Metals

Never wash silver-plated flatware with stainless-steel flatware in the same dishwasher load. The silver and stainless steel chemically react in the presence of automatic dish-washing detergent, causing silver ions to disassociate from the silver plate and transfer to the stainless steel. This leaves pits on the silver plate and may cause spotting of the stainless steel, especially if the metals are touching each other.

Safe Way To Clean

Hand washing with a mild dish-washing liquid is the safest way to clean silver-plated flatware. Wash the flatware in hot sudsy water right after the meal is done. Rinse them with cool tap water and immediately dry with a clean, soft cloth.

Oh dear. Cat Daddy was already unhappy about how much hard work it is to wet-feed the little sod, with the cutting of the food and the frequent bowl changes, so he was not pleased at all to learn that we now need to hand-wash Catorze’s antique silverware. The Unrepeatable Expletives rang out through the air on that fine morn like the chimes of Big Ben on New Year’s Eve (except going on for considerably longer).

Sitting in proud admiration of himself, knowing that he deserves decent serving implements.

Here I am (below), having just used antique Louis XIV silverware to mash up already-soft Cool Cat Club cod and salmon pâté on Catorze’s Necoichi tilted stress-free (I’m not joking; it really is called that) cat bowl, adding a garnish of Orijen. Meanwhile, I am eating cheese on toast from a chipped Wilko* plate.

How did it come to this?

*Fancy followers: ask your more downmarket friends.

Marcus Wareing would be so impressed with this presentation.

52 thoughts on “L’argenterie royale”

    1. Oh dear! This was always going to happen, wasn’t it? Better get to it and get internetting; you may just about be able to save yourselves.

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  3. Well, if any aspiring thieves read Louis’s blog there may not be a problem with the silverware much longer….On the other hand, Catorze appears to be on watch.

    PS Is there any chance that it would actually fall to CD to wash said siverware?

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    1. You make a very good point. It’s far more likely that I’ll be the one to wash it, so I might get away with not saying anything?

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  4. Oh my whiskers! The Tribe here is absolutely over the moon about this special silverware. You should see the scroungy, cheap Pier One fork The Human uses to serve us our wet food. Clearly there is a lack of proper service in our home. We have told her to read this post and then find suitable silverware with which to feed us. Good grief, does a cat have to take are of everything?

    BTW Louis, we loved the photo. You are quite pleased with yourself and with an expression suitable for royalty.
    Purrs & Head Bonks,
    Alberto, Oliver and Lily

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    1. I don’t know Pier One because we are in the U.K., but I bet it’s better than Wilco! But you are right that if you’re not getting the best of the best, the humans most likely need a nudge in the right direction …

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            2. I hadn’t heard of B&M either, until we moved north, but I have just discovered – today!! – that they have the cheapest Lik-e-lix in town 🙂

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  5. Look on the bright side. Your plate isn’t from Poundland.

    Of course, you need a Louis XIV (style) knife too. Oh and teaspoon. He, naturellement, needs the complete set.

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  8. I have yet to have a kitty that will eat chunks in gravy that they don’t eat the gravy and leave the chunks.

    Similarly, with one exception, they all require special treatment of the pâté style kitty food. I have to add a bit of water to the plate and mush the pâté into it. Next, an important step, is to microwave the food for seven seconds. Not six; never eight; seven precisely because they can tell!

    Finally, presentation.

    This varied from cat to cat, but the current kitty requires a floor show first, where we open cabinet doors in the kitchen so he can make his “mousie inspection tour”. There’ve never been any mouses here, a fact Andy the Perian must think has to do with his proficiency as a kitty.

    This show also requires lots of petting, scritching” the head and ears, and high praise the whole time – “What a fine ‘mousie’ catcher! You’re the best kitty, Andrew! Good boy!”

    After all this, I have to put out a few kitty treats before he checks out the plate of water-downed, microwaved pâté. If all presentation meets his high standards, he eats the pâté or leaves half of it to dry out or none of it to get really gross.

    I tell you this so you realize Louis Catorze is a gemme rare! It can be worse!

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    1. Good grief! That is quite the Herculean labour! I had no idea Monsieur André was so high maintenance. 😱😱😱

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  10. My French is very rusty and the title of this post initially threw me. “Argenterie” HAD to mean something other than silverware because Cats, obviously, do not need silverware. More fool me! Of course Louis requires fancy serving utensils and, also of course, cousin Darth now wants some, too.

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    1. Of course he does! I bet he will go on hunger strike until he receives some, as your punishment for thinking cats didn’t need silverware!

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    1. Hilariously, the reason he doesn’t have a Lalique goblet is mainly because of Cat Daddy, who has past form in kicking over le gobelet royal!

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