

The American way of using fork and knife is inefficient and inelegant. - helloamar
http://www.slate.com/articles/life/culturebox/2013/06/fork_and_knife_use_americans_need_to_stop_cutting_and_switching.single.html

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Afforess
I hate dining etiquette. It's a fancy way of saying " _doing something a
specific way because that 's the way everyone else does it_". Groupthink at
it's highest. I eat whatever way is best suited for the meal.

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Svip
Fight the power!

Still, I eat with proper European table manners, because it's all we have
left. Without that, it would be total anarchy! We might as well wear trousers
on our heads and wear baguettes for shoes!

What's next? Wearing a neck tie on a shirt with buttons in the collar or - God
forbid! - with short sleeves?! _gags at the idea_

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tsewlliw
The contrarian in me now says "Cut and then bring the bite to your mouth with
your knife, the fork is now a stabilizing tool, also mock every European who
doesn't".

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jpatokal
If you really want efficiency, eat South-East Asian style: spoon in the right,
fork in the left. The fork is used to hold onto larger things and to rake food
onto your spoon, but it never goes into your mouth; the spoon shovels food
into your mouth, and its edge can be used to cut as well. This way you can
plow through rice and curry like you wouldn't believe, and it's a surprisingly
good way of eating even things like chicken legs doused in sauce without
getting your hands dirty.

In much of Asia, knifes are reserved for the kitchen, where it's the cook's
job to chop everything up into bite-size pieces before being served.

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snogglethorpe
God I hate it when people try to push this stupid line...

I used to live with a British flatmate who was otherwise a nice person, but
would constantly harp on me when I was eating "You're using your knife and
fork incorrectly."

So for a while, I tried it her way, just to see if I could get used to it, and
if it was actually better. After a while, I could kinda do it, but frankly, it
always felt awkward and clumsy, and there was no obvious advantage.

Both techniques have their merits—lack of switching -versus- use of primary
hand for extra knife power/control—but frankly, both work just fine, neither
is obviously superior, and the main difference is _what you 're used to_ (in
most cases, over _decades_ ).

If you're eating dinner the the Queen, then yeah, take a cutlery course first,
learn how she does it, and try to do that. She probably doesn't care, but hey,
you're eating with the Queen, so a little deference to tradition and pomp
seems the way to go.

Otherwise, just do what feels natural to you. If someone whines at you, ask
them which hand they'd prefer to be stabbed by, and if you're doing it
wrong...

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graeme
Interesting. I used to hold the fork in my right the entire time, cutting with
knife in my left hand.

Upon being informed that was a faux pas, I cut with the fork in my left, knife
in right.

Finding it difficult to lift the food with my left hand, I intuitively adopted
cut and switch and would eat with my right.

Noticing that no one around me (in Quebec) seemed to do this, I eventually
adopted the European manner.

Now, following the Paleo diet, I frequently end up simply eating with my hands
when at home. Feels great.

www.marksdailyapple.com/eat-with-your-hands/‎

I'm now either incredibly avant garde or a brute.

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kyllo
I'm American and I've never done cut-and-switch. Since I was a kid, I've
always knifed with my left and forked with my right. Never understood why
people feel the need to cut meat with their right hand. So weird to me.

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fishtoaster
Presumably because cutting meat takes more strength and/or control than simply
holding the meat still. It seem reasonable to relegate the latter to your non-
dominant hand.

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peeters
I find getting the fork into my mouth to require much finer motor skills than
the simple sawing motion required for cutting. I'm with GP. I just keep the
fork in the right hand and cut with the left.

As a kid, I was a cut-and-switcher, so maybe cutting with the right was more
natural, but it definitely didn't seem hard to make the switch.

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zoowar
Better still, relegate the knife to food prep.

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sliverstorm
You must be a cuts-steak-with-side-of-fork kind of guy, like me!

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jamesaguilar
Rampant, completely unsubstantiated speculation that is probably contradicted
by the evidence: I wonder if we'd be even more fat if we didn't switch.
Switching slows down your eating, and I know that there is data to show that
slower eating means you eat less. I guess the foods we eat too much of that
are really bad for you, like snacks, sandwiches, and sodas, don't take a fork
and knife at all.

That said, my wife and I are eating out French tonight, so I'll try to put
down my guilt and manners and not switch hands!

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omgsean
I'm left handed, never been an issue. I also never understood why table
settings are the only thing where the world seems to appreciate my left-
handedness.

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Svip
I actually think it is supposed to make it a challenge to eat properly, to
prove - at least when these manners were invented centuries ago - that one was
a well-educated and respected member of the right part of society.

At the same time these rules were invented, you would have been hanged or
worse for a good word, because of your left-handedness. Weirdo.

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FajitaNachos
I thought this was going to be about using chopsticks.

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unkoman
Brutes, using two hands to eat.

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Index820
Because getting food into us faster is a serious efficiency problem plaguing
Americans everywhere.

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plant42
It is more common in Europe to hold the fork in your left hand rather than
your right. But I think that has more to do with handedness than anything.

I'm right-handed, yet hold the fork in my right hand and often get comments
about being 'cack-handed'.

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Svip
Part of being part of human society is to fight your basic instincts, which -
as a right-handed person - would make you use the fork with the right hand.
Hence why you should use the left hand.

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PassTheAmmo
Still beats chopsticks.

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etep
inefficiency can infer

