When I was a child growing up in our little town in southeastern Austria, a big pot of soup was often the centerpiece of our dinner table on a cool autumn evening. My mother would take hearty ...

DEAR MISS MANNERS: I am soon to host a semiformal dinner -- and no, I don’t know exactly what that means (I was kind of roped into it). I plan to have hors d’oeuvres, soup, salad, a main course, ...