SubTopic: Your Menu to manners
Note: Hint: no one can be expected to know every food and how to eat it. Do your best and see if you can find some of the rules that are associated with them to be false.
Meat:
No matter how thick or thin, cut off one satisfying bite at a time.
Chicken:
With a knife and fork at a table, always get as much meat off as you can before picking up a bone. And as you wish at picnics and with family at home.
Fowl:
Acquiring all the meat from a partridge, quail, squab or whatever, with a knife and fork is unfounded. Except in uncommonly formal circumstances, cut off all the meat you can with your knife and fork, then pick up a tiny bone daintily and put it in your mouth, still holding the end of the bone with a dainty touch. Quietly, suck the meat off, then put the bone back on the plate. For an adventure, you can put the bone all the way into your mouth with your fork, suck off the meat and put the bone back on the plate with your fingers.
Breads:
Bread is broken in relatively small pieces and buttered just before eating. You put the bread on your plate to spread it or hold a small piece in your fingers – never on the palm of your hand. Hot bread is better buttered all at once so the butter can melt in it, and this is all right, but you still break it one piece at a time to eat it. Bread may be used to absorb gravy or juices and to cover spoiled food. You can put a small piece in the plate, and stick your fork in it to wipe up the gravy and eat it.
Cake:
The Rules: With a fork, if it's sticky. In the fingers, if it's dry.
Candy:
Take the decorative paper cup, too, when it is passed.
Salads:
Should be made crisp and with manageable pieces to allow you to break it with a fork, but if it isn't, use your knife.
Condiments
Butter/sour cream:
Spread it with a butter knife, or any other knife,use a fork
if you are putting it on something in your dinner plate.
Sauces:
SOLID: These (cranberry sauce, etc.) go on the dinner plate beside the food they come with, or on the butter plate, to be eaten along with the food not on the food.
LIQUID: Pour them on top of the food they go with.
Gravies:
Gravy should stay mostly on the meat, not on everything else on the plate, potatoes should be dipped in the gravy with your fork. Sopping up the gravy with bread (on a fork, not in the fingers)
Pickles:
Whole or with sandwiches, they are eaten with your fingers. With meat, slices are eaten with a fork.
Olives:
The pitted kind, if they are very large, is eaten whole with your fingers, or in a few bites. If they have pits, since the pit is attached firmly, it is very hard to separate the pit from the meat in your mouth, so you may use your fingers and eat around the pit.
Radishes:
Take one at a time and eat with your fingers.
Relishes:
Put them next to the food they go with, or on the side of your dinner or butter plate and eat them on the fork along with the bite of food. Never dump it on top of the food you are eating.
Salt:
If you need a few pinches of salt for dipping, as with celery, and there is only one salt shaker, put a little pile on the edge of your plate. If there is an open salt dish for several people and no salt spoon use the tip of your clean knife blade. If the salt dish is just for you, a pinch is taken in the fingers.
Not so simple foods
Sandwiches:
Made with two pieces of bread, use your fingers. Big juicy un manageable ones are cut up with a knife and then eaten with the fingers or with a fork. Open hot sandwiches with thick gravy need a fork and knife.
Spaghetti /Long Pasta/ noodles
Holds a large spoon with the bowl upright against the plate in your left hand and, catching a few strands of spaghetti with the fork in your right hand, turn the fork against the bowl of the spoon until strands are neatly wound around it in a modest lump. If you prefer you may cut the strands with your fork.
Pizza:
Cut like a pie, but eaten in the hand. Do not use a knife and fork. With a spoon, when cut up and served in a bowl.
Seafood
Oysters:
ON THE HALF SHELL, RAW: They are eaten like clams.
COOKED: They are picked up with the fork, dipped in sauce, if any, and eaten whole or cut in half with a knife if they are too large.
Shrimps:
UNSHELLED: Shell with clean hands and fingers and eat whole, dip them in the sauce, eat the shrimp and discard the tail.
SHRIMP COCKTAIL: please refer to crabmeat cocktail.
FRIED: Cut in half, if large; whole with a fork if small, dip them in the sauce, eat the shrimp and discard the tail.
FRIED FANTAIL SHRIMP: Pick them up by the tail (if it has the tail still on), Cut in half, if large; whole with a fork if small, dip them in the sauce, eat the shrimp and discard the tail.
Crabs:
CRABMEAT COCKTAIL:
You eat it with an oyster fork. If you run across a piece of hard membrane, just take it out of your mouth with your fingers.
HARD-SHELLED CRABS and Lobster : You may start anywhere you like, but most people first pull off the small claws and suck or chew the meat out of the open end. Then you lift out the body meat in one piece, cut it up with a knife and fork and eat it, dipping it piece by piece into the sauce. The coral and green material in the body is also eatable. The claws should be cracked before the crabs are served, but often a nutcracker comes with it, in case you want to crack the claws more. Break the claws with your fingers, take out the meat with your oyster fork or a pick, dip it in the sauce and eat it. You then use the finger bowl, or wet cloth supplied.
SOFT-SHELLED CRABS: Every part is edible. Just cut them up with a knife and fork and eat them.
Clams:
ON THE HALF SHELL: begin by holding the shell with your left hand and lift the clam out using your oyster fork in your right. Slowly, dip the clam in the sauce and put it whole in your mouth.
STEAMED: You eat them with your fingers. The shells should be opened when you get them and you are given a bowl of broth and a bowl of melted butter. (Or sometimes the butter is melted right in the broth.) Lift the clam out of its shell by the neck and pull the body out of the neck sheath with the other hand. Put the sheath aside. Holding the clam by the neck, dunk it up and down several times in the broth to get rid of the sand, dip it in the butter, and eat it. After the clams are finished, drink the broth, if you like. A bowl to put the empty shells in is convenient, but if there is none, just pile them on the edge of your plate. As a rule they are never served under formal circumstances because they are too drippy
Fresh Fish:
A whole fish is easier to eat if you bone it. You hold it down with your fork, cut off the head, slit it down the underside and lay it open. Then you insert your knife under the front end of the backbone and lift the whole thing out, putting it on the edge of your plate. There probably will be some small bones left. These you take out of your mouth with your fingers after having cleaned them as much as you can and lay them on the edge of the plate with the backbone.
Mussels:
Pick them out of the shells with your fork, or pick up the shell and quietly suck them out of it. The shells go on a side plate so you can eat the sauce (which is thin and soupy) afterwards. You do this with a spoon or by sopping it up with small pieces of bread held on your fork.
Delicacies
Escargot:
Commonly served with a special holder with which to grip the hot shell. Hold this in your left hand, pick out the snail with a pick or oyster fork in your right and eat it whole. If necessary, you may drink the juice from the shell by tipping it in your mouth (shell held in your hand) when it has cooled.
Caviar:
On toast, and never with a fork.
Frogs' Legs:
These are eaten as birds are. (See Fowl)
Soup:
IN A CUP WITH HANDLES: Take a sip with the spoon to test it is drinkable, if it not too hot and is desirable, drink it, holding the cup by one handle. When applicable, use the spoon again to get shrimps, vegetables or whatever from the bottom. The spoon goes in the saucer next to the cup with handles when you are through.
IN A PLATE: Scoop away from yourself with the spoon and drink the soup from the side of the spoon unless it's too thick. If it is, then at the end is acceptable. The plate may be tipped, away from you, to get the last drop. Place quietly the spoon in the soup plate when you are finished.
IN A BOWL: Scoop up the soup in your spoon, dipping the spoon away from you. Afterward, leave the spoon under the bowl in the plate.
Fruits:
Oranges:
Pits go into your hand and back on the plate. If served like grapefruit, then they are eaten the same way. You may have to peel a whole orange with a sharp knife, or with your fingers when you are in a less formal setting. Separate the segments and eat them whole or cut in half if they are very large.
Bananas:
Simply peel it all the way and then break or cut it in pieces to eat, with the fingers or a fork.
Berries:
With a spoon, but if large strawberries are served with the stem in a pile or bowl, pick up the berry by the stem, dip it, eat it and put the stem on your plate.
Stewed Fruit: Since it is eaten with a spoon, the pits are taken out of your mouth with a spoon and put on the side of the plate.
Grapefruit:
When it is served halved, lift out each segment with a spoon and eat it. Get what juice you can by scooping it up with the spoon. Don't pick it up and squeeze it, except in private.
Apples:
Best to eat with your hands, informally, but when they are served as a course, peel, quarter and core them and eat the pieces with clean hands and fingers.
Apricots:
STEWED: Eat the pit if unavoidable and remove the pit from your mouth with your spoon.
RAW: Eat them without peeling or cutting and put the cleaned pit back on the plate with your fingers.
Grapes:
Seedless grapes should not be a problem. You simply cut or break a bunch off from the stalk and put it on your plate. You eat the grapes one at a time. With seeded grapes, if you can eat the skin, place them in your mouth, separate the seeds there and drop them into your hand to put on the plate. Inedible skins should be separated with the tongue in the mouth, not by chewing. An easier method is to squeeze the inside into the mouth with your fingers, separating the seeds in the mouth. Incidentally, never pick single grapes off a fruit centerpiece.
Tangerines:
Please refer to oranges that are not peeled.
Pineapple:
Large pieces on a plate are cut with a knife and fork and eaten with a fork. Long rectangle sticks, served informally, are eaten with the fingers.
Plums:
Please refer to apricots.
Peaches:
Quarter with a sharp knife and pull or peel off the skin, then cut it up and eat it with a fork.
Pears:
Same as apples.
Persimmons:
Rarely served whole because they are too juicy to eat gracefully a Persimmon, when served in the skin with the top cut off, eat like an avocado.
Kumquats:
With the fingers. Large ones are eaten in a couple of bites, small one all at once, whole.
Cherries:
Please refer to Apricots.
Mangoes:
When whole you quarter them with a sharp knife, then turn a quarter, skin side up, on your plate and holding it with your fork, peel (not cut) skin away from the fruit. The juicy part that remains is cut up and eaten with the fork. Mango juice stains cloth, so use paper napkins when eating. Or just eat them with a spoon if they are already prepared.
Melons:
CANTALOUPE: With a spoon to hold the juice.
HONEYDEW: With either a spoon or a fork, its your choice.
WATERMELON: With a fork, after getting as many seeds out as possible. Seeds in your mouth go into your hand and then to the plate
Vegetables:
Potatoes:
BAKED: When the potato is already slit at the top and buttered, hold it with one hand and scoop out the insides bite by bite with your fork. If it is whole, do not take out the insides all at the same time and put the skin aside. Break it with your fingers , hold it with one hand and scoop out the insides bite by bite with your fork, after putting sour cream, butter, salt and pepper in it. If you want to eat the skin, do it by cutting it like meat, one satisfying bite at a time.
SHOE STRING AND POTATO CHIPS: Eat with your fingers.
FRENCH FRIED: Cut them with a knife in two if they are long and eat with a fork. Never, Never pick up the whole piece and bite off part of it.
Corn on the Cob:
Pick it up in your fingers at both ends. (Holders may be supplied and stuck into the ends) You season a couple of rows, eat them, then season the next few. Mix a pile of butter with salt and pepper on your plate if you like, so you can season all at once. A long ear may be broken in half., but it really is easier to eat when you can get a direct grip on it. There just is no elegant way of eating it, so you will most definitely not find it at formal dinners
Avocados:
When served split in half with the seed cavity filled with something, you steady the shell with the left hand and scoop out the contents with your spoon.
Celery:
Take it in your fingers when it is passed and put it on the side of your plate. Salt it or dip it in a little pile of salt and bite it off bit by bit.
Asparagus:
Cut off the tender tip with your fork, in several sections if it is tender enough and put it in your mouth. You eat only what can be cut with the fork. At home you might pick up the end in your fingers and bite off a bit more, but you never bite off so much that you must spit out a tough part.
Artichokes:
Are enjoyed and eaten with clean hands, fingers and nails. Artichokes are eaten in two stages: First take off a leaf, then dip the soft end into the sauce, and scrape about a third of the leaf with your bottom teeth to get the tender part. (the inside of the leaf should face down towards the bottom teeth for easier management of the artichoke's essence). Carefully, pile the used and uneaten leaves on the side of your plate. After the leave are all off, the"choke" and "heart" remains (you have just eaten "Arti"). Choke (named appropriately because if eaten, it may make you choke) are many fine tiny leaves with very spiky tips. (I prefer not to eat this). Lastly, gently scoop the choke out with your knife, leaving a "hallow" in the base. ( the hollow will be seen as a smooth creator with pore holes from the choke. Carefully cut up the heart with your knife and fork and eat it piece by piece, after dipping each piece in the sauce or squeezing lemon and sprinkling breadcrumbs on it.
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