Etiquette lessons?

[kc8ufv]

I remember someone saying that he always relied on watching those around him for the correct etiquette to use, and this always worked until one day when he was in a situation where he realised everyone was watching him to see how to he was going to start eating some unfamiliar item. So I guess his method served him well up to that point, I mean, so well that it made him a role model. In my away-from-home youth, I used to wait to be served asparagus spears, which I had been told could correctly be eaten with the fingers- but no one ever did produce it in a mannered setting. So my one advanced tip on vegetables has lain dormant.

My only experience with asparagus is with it being part of something else, and usually the appropriate utinsels are a pair of chopsticks...

[JerseyLawyer]

In my away-from-home youth, I used to wait to be served asparagus spears, which I had been told could correctly be eaten with the fingers- but no one ever did produce it in a mannered setting. So my one advanced tip on vegetables has lain dormant.

Quite correct. Both asparagus and whole artichoke are finger foods. However, to complicate matters, if the asparagus is served in sauce, and is therefore limp, it will make a mess if you pick it up, so then you have to cut it with knife and fork and eat it that way.

[Lallans]

My only experience with asparagus is with it being part of something else, and usually the appropriate utinsels are a pair of chopsticks...

Chopsticks make everything correct, surely. Of course there is the whole issue of how to correctly hold the sticks themselves....

[longhuntr74]

Thanks to all for the sound and sage advice and a little bit of humor. I literally laughed aloud at a couple of the comments (to be specific, the image of Tobus stabbing his food and eating it off his knife and MoR's comment about hunching over your plate if you're getting shot at!).

I don't consider myself uncultured, but like most Americans, I was not taught formal etiquette growing up. I can remember being embarrassed about going to Scout Camp at about the age of 11 or 12 because I held my fork like a shovel and was afraid people would pick on me for how I ate. I taught myself the proper way to hold a fork (American style) to avoid that embarrassment.

I learned my first etiquette through reading "The Army Officer's Guide"...a commercially produced publication aimed at pre-commissioning cadets and new Lieutenants. It teaches about several Army traditions and also about proper dress for different functions and the like. I learned about things like Commanding Officers' New Year's receptions, calling cards, and receiving lines. I actually attended one or two of these events as a Lieutenant or Captain...but sadly I have noticed that these customs and traditions have all but disappeared from Army life. Apparently as an Army at War we're too busy for such silly functions...and the price we pay is that the current generation of Soldiers and Officers are wholly unaware that these traditions ever existed.

[Cygnus]

Chopsticks make everything correct, surely. Of course there is the whole issue of how to correctly hold the sticks themselves....

Which is why I get a kick out of watching people try to make a good impression while eating with chopsticks. Even if they hold them properly, getting food (especially rice and noodles) from a dish on the table to one's mouth is a challenge. I've always been taught that, when eating with chopsticks, it is acceptable to lift the dish off the table to eat.

I've only once eaten with chopsticks in a formal situation, though, and I may have seemed very rude to some of the other guests who spent the evening trying unsuccessfully to eat without making a mess.

[Tobus]

Butter knives are smaller flatware knives. A lot of people tend to use their own knife to slice and spread butter on their bread, potatoes and what have you. The butter knife is used to slice the butter and place it on your plate, and then you use your own knife to spread the butter where you like.

Think of it like a serving spoon, but for butter.

Ah, OK. That just seems like common sense and culinary cleanliness to me, not necessarily etiquette. I thought you were talking about some sort of faux-pas that Americans were making on how they hold the knife, spread the butter, or something similar.

I would put this subject under the same heading as double-dipping with a chip (crisp in the UK, I believe). You don't contaminate the source.

Thanks to all for the sound and sage advice and a little bit of humor. I literally laughed aloud at a couple of the comments (to be specific, the image of Tobus stabbing his food and eating it off his knife and MoR's comment about hunching over your plate if you're getting shot at!).

Humor aside, there are people here in Texas that do prefer to eat off their knives. Not necessarily in cultured settings, mind. But in the spirit of "doing as the Romans do", if you're sitting around the campfire eating fresh ribeye with a bunch of Texas cowboys after a long day of rounding up cattle, it's perfectly acceptable. Tuck that little tidbit of information away in case you ever need it!

[Lallans]

Which is why I get a kick out of watching people try to make a good impression while eating with chopsticks. Even if they hold them properly, getting food (especially rice and noodles) from a dish on the table to one's mouth is a challenge. I've always been taught that, when eating with chopsticks, it is acceptable to lift the dish off the table to eat.

I've only once eaten with chopsticks in a formal situation, though, and I may have seemed very rude to some of the other guests who spent the evening trying unsuccessfully to eat without making a mess.

In Japan at least, it's considered low class to hold chopsticks ('hachi') near the working end- it's desirable to hold them as far up as possible. I make that a practice whereever I go, just in case it's universal. But it seems that the hardest way is always the most polite.

[piperdbh]

...there are people here in Texas that do prefer to eat off their knives. ...if you're sitting around the campfire eating fresh ribeye with a bunch of Texas cowboys after a long day of rounding up cattle, it's perfectly acceptable. Tuck that little tidbit of information away in case you ever need it!

Consider it tucked.

[JerseyLawyer]

Humor aside, there are people here in Texas that do prefer to eat off their knives. Not necessarily in cultured settings, mind. But in the spirit of "doing as the Romans do", if you're sitting around the campfire eating fresh ribeye with a bunch of Texas cowboys after a long day of rounding up cattle, it's perfectly acceptable. Tuck that little tidbit of information away in case you ever need it!

There was a Jeopardy question that went something like, "According to the Handbook of Texas Etiquette, this is the plural form of y'all." The answer was "What is all y'all?"

A very good friend of mine who is a lifetime Alabamian, insists stridently that "y'all" is the proper second person plural, and that only the younger set use (improperly) "all y'all".

So, when in Rome - or Huntsville, Birmingham, Montgomery, or Mobile, I guess... :P

[Jock Scot]

Tobus.

I have had occasion to have a knife as my only eating(apart from fingers) tool many a time-----out in the Australian outback for one----- and have been more than happy to do so.However one does not necessarily need to bring those basic conditions home with us, do we?

Every one.

Of course every country has its own way of doing things even down to eating procedures around the table. In my experience there is a surprising similarity around the world when it comes to courtesy and etiquette and as long as you keep your eyes and mind open, little offence will be given and any minor faux pas is politely accepted and often forgiven with good humour.

But as MoR has quite correctly observed, there is nothing silly in asking questions if you want to learn.