1 hour ago, Lisa Shock said:OK, I could use some help here. A friend of mine has a small sterling silver cup which he believes to be a tastevin. To me, it simply isn't, but I cannot say what it is. Below are pictures. The cup itself is 2" in diameter and a little over 3" tall. (so it's more like a shot glass, whereas a tastevin is shallow and wide, so you can swirl the wine and observe and smell it) It has a smaller base, up to about half of the side is smaller (kind of like the top part of a double boiler) so it appears to have been made to sit inside another container. One side has a curved loop which appears to be designed to act as a hinge, or maybe just perch on the rim of something else. The other side has a stem and handle, about 3" long, which resembles a hat pin. The plastic/bakelite ball is very red. Any insight would be greatly appreciated!
Does these look familiar?
It is an alcohol cup, missing its lid, which sits under a chafing dish and holds denatured alcohol. It should have a slotted lid to contain and direct the flame. This one looks like it is from the Art Deco era.
I looked at hundreds of chafing dishes from various eras when I was catering. At one time I had a dozen, many had cups similar to this, some were more elaborate with little burner controls and in some the cups were not removable.
They had to be when they were silver so they could be polished.
I found a few other examples of this type of cup. A mid-century modern style similar to some I had in the 1980s.
