When seated at a fancy dinner a couple of weeks ago, I realised I had to engage my long-dormant knowledge of cutlery so I didn’t commit a culinary faux pas.
It’s not often, these days, that you’ll find a formal place setting on a table. Mr. Carson from ‘Downton Abbey’ would no doubt be appalled to see the lack of oyster forks, fish knives and sherry glasses at a modern meal. Where is the white tie? And the underbutler? It’s a world gone mad!
Growing up, we were taught the ‘correct way’ to use a knife, fork and spoon. Many were the minutes I spent trying to get peas to stay on the back of my fork – and conveyed to my gaping maw – before they fell to eager pets waiting under the table. Then there was the whole process of lifting the bowl at the edge closest to one, in order for one’s soup to gather in the opposite gully so one didn’t scrape the porcelain with one’s spoon whilst plumbing the shallow depths of the remnants.
It seems, like cursive writing, such particular education is (somewhat) dying out. It’s a more casual world we’re living in. I’m not saying that’s necessarily a bad thing. I’ve been caught proudly eating noodles with only a fork in my right hand, sitting on the couch with a cutting board acting as a tray. Nothing wrong with it at all. As people have brought their own unique preferences into the mix, so many different methods of tackling food have revealed themselves. Of course, I’ll be using my best friend Lynne as a first example.
As many of you know, Lynne and I have shared a home with a clowder of cats (the official collective noun – who knew?) for years. Like any other relationship, you don’t really know someone until you decide to live in the same dwelling. Just like she had no idea that I was basically allergic to housework, so I was oblivious to the fact that she autopsied her food.
Let’s take the noble hamburger. In its most basic form, it is a meat patty with lettuce, tomato, onion, ketchup, mayonnaise (or Miracle Whip, if you’re a heathen), sitting betwixt two beautiful bun halves. From there, a person can add bacon, cheese and all manner of weird and wonderful toppings, but the burger in its purest form is simple perfection.
Lynne disagrees. “It’s too much bread,” she explained, when I first witnessed her take a knife and cut the top bun-half along its centre x-axis. Yup; she decapitated it.
I barely had time to recover from reeling at that sight before I caught her eating a Jamaican patty with a knife and fork. It instantly reminded me of that ‘Seinfeld’ episode where Mr. Pitt used cutlery on a Snickers bar, and before we could say Jack Robinson, people all around Manhattan were employing flatware to cut up candy and cookies.
There used to be (somewhat) unspoken rules about what you should and should not do with utensils. I remember, back when I was a fresh-faced university student in London, pooling my money with my friend Tara Leslie so we could go for a semi-fancy meal at Garfunkel’s or Angus Steakhouse – one of the two. We got a booth next to a window so we could watch pedestrians strolling by, and tucked into the meal that the ATM had seen fit to bless us with. (The machine was not always so kind, depending on the state of our finances.)
Revelling in a dish that, for once, wasn’t Pot Noodle, I didn’t want a morsel to go to waste… so I started licking my knife. Mid-slurp, I caught, out of the corner of my eye, a foot-traveller outside grinding to a halt and staring incredulously at me through the window, then mimicking what I was doing and shaking their head vigorously from side to side. Apparently, it didn’t matter how much I was enjoying my food; cleaning a knife with my tongue was just not cricket.
These days, we can hold our implements the traditional way; or like we’re teasing a snare drum with brushes; or even as one would play the cello, with the fork upright like the instrument, and the knife perpendicular, sawing into a steak like a bow; but heaven forbid licking the knife in public. It’s the perfect combination of appalling and dangerous.
Naturally, when one speaks of forks, knives, spoons et al, one must recognise that not everyone limits themselves to these choices. An obvious option is chopsticks, which I thought I’d absolutely mastered until I saw experts effortlessly eating rice at a dizzying pace. And who can forget the much-maligned spork? I thought it was a very modern invention, but based on a small amount of further research, it looks as though people have been eating soup and piercing fruit with the same all-in-one device since the late 19th century.
The first time I came across a spork was at KFC right here in Cayman, and I figured the patent was owned by the company. Wow, I thought. Not only had they realised that only 10 herbs-and-spices just weren’t going to cut it; they had also invented the perfect tool for cradling coleslaw. That colonel was one savvy dude.
In some countries, any kind of flatware is considered superfluous to requirements. Eating with the hands alone is fine, and doesn’t that sound fantastic? So long as licking fingers isn’t frowned upon, and there are napkins nearby, this has got to be the way forward.
According to various sites, “The tradition of eating food with the hands is called ‘kamayan’. Kamayan is an ancient tradition in many areas of the Middle East because there is belief that eating with the hands rather than utensils has its benefits. You betcha! No dirty forks (who doesn’t love that Monty Python sketch?), no dishwasher hijinks… sign me up, I’m on board. Some even say the food tastes better this way; I just don’t see a down side.
However, while looking into this whole ‘hands’ thing, and seeing how it could be incorporated more often in my routine, I learned that it is supposedly considered rude in India to allow your left hand to come into contact with food, and to eat off your own plate with it. I wondered if this was going to be the best choice for me. Visions of bungling it in polite company immediately sprang to mind, my left hand covered in sauce as I gesticulated wildly through one of my 15-minute stories.
Maybe I’d stick with familiar flatware.
As I said at the start of this particular column, I certainly don’t think moving away from bananas formal dining is a bad thing at all. I love my ‘Downton Abbey’, but the idea of getting on the glad rags and gloves for a simple spot of tea, leaves me cold. On the other hand, I do think I need to make more of an effort to use the dining table for meals with friends and family, rather than trying to balance trays of food on knees while pushing away inquisitive cats and watching the latest episode of ‘Succession’.
The tradition of sitting down together is not just about the dinner; it’s about the camaraderie and conversation as well. Seems an appropriate sentiment around Thanksgiving time. Doesn’t have to be fancy – be as casual as you like… just don’t lick the knife.
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