Garten shared how exactly she goes about setting a table in an early 2000s issue of House Beautiful. At the time the now 73-year-old had a column in the publication called Ask the Barefoot Contessa.

Truth be told, I’m useless in the kitchen—boiling water for tea and making toast is about as advanced as I get. What gets me excited is the kitchen-adjacent art of table setting; it allows me to get ...