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Does Molecular Gastronomy Make You Nervous?
This form of cooking is very accessible to the home cook, like ridiculously accessible... All it is, is taking old techniques and re-inventing them.
The foam can be made with coconut cream, and creme anglaise, all you have to do is agitate it enough, and scrape off the foam. The ice cream is easy, the tuille is easy, and the braised pineapple is easy.
For every other crazy technique, like faux caviar or foams, check out recipes online, its easy, and i think if you're a home cook that likes to experiment, try these new things, it'll surely impress your friends.
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Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
this is insane... ive been eating like this since i can remember, and my grandfather always commented on it and how i was soooo "european" but didn't really understand til i lately.
but really, right before i read this article i was eating steak, braised cabbage, and roasted potatoes, and incoherently made sure i had a small piece of each for the last bite lol
Does Molecular Gastronomy Make You Nervous?
This form of cooking is very accessible to the home cook, like ridiculously accessible... All it is, is taking old techniques and re-inventing them.
The foam can be made with coconut cream, and creme anglaise, all you have to do is agitate it enough, and scrape off the foam. The ice cream is easy, the tuille is easy, and the braised pineapple is easy.
For every other crazy technique, like faux caviar or foams, check out recipes online, its easy, and i think if you're a home cook that likes to experiment, try these new things, it'll surely impress your friends.
Does Molecular Gastronomy Make You Nervous?
the tasting menu at WD-50 blew my mind away. it opened a whole new world of textures and flavor combinations for me. i will agree not everything worked, but the ones they did pull off were spectacular. yes, a lot of it will end up being a stupid fab/trend, but i am excited about the new ground that is being explored here.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I'm an American lefty and I've always eaten in a basic European manner; friend's grandmother and her European friends. Except, I hold my knife in my left hand and fork in my right. I am pretty much ambidextrous about everything but handwriting.
Also, it's very bad manners to cut up all of something before eating. Just as it is bad manners to butter all of a roll/slice of bread (unless it's breakfast toast) before eating. Some Americans just have very bad table manners.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I have always eaten like this, and I'm nothing but a dirty Texan. No utensil switching, and must have one bite of everything on my fork at meal's end! It's like a mini eating game - rationing amongst the serving proportions. I guess I never realized most folks don't do it this way - always too absorbed in my own plate. :)
Does Molecular Gastronomy Make You Nervous?
the link to the article doesn't work.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
How do Americans eat then. I must ask as an Englishman.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I'd never even thought about this but it is so true. Great post.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I'm an American who has never travelled abroad (not by choice, I assure you). Fork-switching seems perfectly natural to me, because it means the dominant hand does all the persnickety work. Fork concave-side-up - well, it just feels like things are less likely to fall off.
Having said that, I've never cut up an entire steak/chop/meat-thing at once before taking the first bite.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I agree with Becca (and am also named Rebecca, so maybe it's a Becca thing). I'm right handed. My mom's a leftie. When I was little I used to want to copy everything my mom did, but I could not figure out how to coordinate eating with a fork in my left hand.
Perhaps Brits/Europeans are better at the ambidextrous thing over Americans?
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I'm pretty klutzy. It tends to drop right off my fork.
I think I was meant for the American way of eating.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
Becca: how difficult can it be to use your left hand to move the fork from the plate to your mouth? The knife is not just used for cutting it is also used as a "blocker" that pushes the food onto the fork when the fork is moved towards the fixed knife.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I have tried the European manner of eating but as a righty, it was just too awkward. Since the majority of people are right-handed, how do Europeans do it? The fork is used more than the knife, since some foods don't need to be cut. So why would you use your left for the fork if you are right-handed?
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I don't switch. Fork in left hand, knife in right hand. Born in nyc, raised in nj. I never really noticed these variations in how people use a knife and fork to get food from their plates to their mouths. I think that not switching makes it easier to not drop your utensils on the floor.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
oddly enough i just learned of this phenomenon the other day in a strip of the excellent comic Achewood [which often involves food]. everything makes sense now. here is the link, do check it out: http://achewood.com/index.php?date=10272008
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
@brooke29 - I agree im born and raised British (I live in Leeds) i always assumed that the american style was not in good manners because i was always taught as a child that it is bad to use your fork in your right hand. I actually think it has much more to do with tradition and don't think everyone in the UK, or anywhere else for that matter, uses the same method and don't think it has anything to do with manners just culture. I would say though that pushing copious amounts of food onto a fork is not as prevalent as the post and comments might suggest.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
Well, I currently live in the US, but I was born and raised in England. Now that I think of it, yes, I always "create a perfect bite" when I eat, which requires creating a perfect plate. I don't pile all my food on one plate though, for instance, I always have a separate salad bowl, etc.
@mh330 - I agree. Until I came to the US 6 years ago (OH is an American) I'd been convinced that what appears to be "the American method" of switching knife and fork from hand to hand as you eat, was either something small children would do or just an indication of poor table manners. Actually, that's not quite true - my OH (born in Brooklyn, raised in NJ) eats the same way I do (his parents don't, which even further persuaded me it was poor table manners:-)), and it wasn't until a similar thread appeared in Talk earlier this year that I realised that what I was raised to consider poor table manners was actually "the American method" (as I had said earlier - my apologies to everybody who eats the "American way", I had no idea, and that would be poor manners on my part).
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
Ok, just for the record, in the American style, you cut a piece of meat, switch utensils, then eat that bite. You don't cut the entire steak into bite-sized pieces before eating, unless you are a child, elderly or very ill-mannered.
Just had to clear up the misconception that seemed to be propagating through this thread!
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
Growing up in a Filipino household, I learned to eat with a spoon and fork (when I wasn't eating with my hands). I used the fork to guide the food to my spoon, then shovel the food in my mouth with the spoon. No knives -- we used our spoon to cut the meat since we ate a lot of stew-type meals and the meat was usually soft enough. I thought everyone ate like this, until I got older and learned that nobody else ate like this. Now I eat with a fork, unless I'm eating Filipino food. (Not because I'm ashamed or anything, just because sometimes it's easier to use one utensil rather than two.)
I didn't even think about it being a cultural thing until I was reading one of Ruth Reichl's books, when she visits an Asian country (I think it's Thailand, correct me if I'm wrong) and they're all eating like that. I read that part and thought, "AHA! It's NOT weird!"
And then I found this. Apparently a Filipino boy in Montreal got punished in school for eating this way. Unbelievable.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
This is how my husband eats! I thought he was just a bit weird, but now I'm thinking he picked up the habit from his British/Welsh mother and grandmother.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I can see the merits of both ways, actually. In fact, I use them both at various points of time, often because of a lack of elbow space when lunching at the home of someone who has squeezed *just* too many people around the table. If I ate bangers and mash I'd totally do it the way the guy above does it.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
I never knew the American method was to cut all the food up first, then switching fork hands to eat. Something about that makes me think of a parent cutting up steak for their kid. I've always eaten with the European method. As for piling everything up in one bite, I do that sometimes . . . like if I'm eating a banana split. ;)
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
Fork shifting has always seemed quite primitive to me. Reminds me of small children where the parents have to split everything into tiny pieces before handing the kid a fork/spoon. Guess the Americans never grew away from that habit. Around here it (Scandinavia) it is considered impolite to cut everything into tiny pieces before starting to shovel away the food :-) We do not pile up everything like the Brits do, but instead we cut one, maybe two, mouth-fitting pieces of the meat/potatoes gently add a bit of sauce (if available) and then send it directly to the mouth. Chewing is done with mouth closed and you don't talk while chewing (another thing I often see Americans do). When done eating, the fork and knife are joined together to make a line going from the middle of the dish and towards the lower right of the plate (4o'clock if you think of the plate as being a clock).
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
My first exposure to the "European method" was during college when I did an internship with a bunch of students from France. I've always kind of had confusion with the whole fork and knife in which hand thing, especially since I grew up in an Asian household where the default utensils are spoon and chopsticks, so I was totally fascinated by the way they positively couldn't eat without both fork and knife and how they were always pushing food onto their forks with their knifes. (They once invited us over for dinner and served this salad with corn and other small pieces and I definitely saw the merits of that method...)
I definitely didn't know about this British thing though, and it seems like...a lot of work. Also I've met quite a few people who hate foods touching on their plates so I imagine the thought of this method would give them a panic attack...
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
All that switching around of utensils Americans typically do with the goal that one hand rests in the lap seems awkward and contrived. I guess I resorted to the Eurostyle knife in right/fork in left style as a matter of convenience. Growing up in a chopsticks family, I guess I was always free to choose my fork-n-knife technique and ended up choosing the one that puts food in my mouth faster. Also, I typically just pile a couple of tastes together, as opposed to the Leaning Tower of Peas technique of the Brits, which is awesome, though!
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
You are so right! I left out the most important part of the description, luckily visible in my photos: the fork held upside down. It is their trademark.
Snapshots from the UK: How the English Eat
@anzee, that cracks me up that you think the European method is cavemanish, because i totally think the Americna method is cavemanish! :) Seriously, keeping your utensils in each hand, and forcing your knife hand to stay at table level forces your FORK hand to raise itself to your mouth. Kind of civilized, to me. As for the American method, its like you're saying you're being served a hunk of meat and you have to finish "preparing" it yourself by cutting it up, and once you've finished that task, you can switch your fork to your right hand, lower your head to your plate (as many ppl do) and then start to shovel food in your mouth. Definitely less civilized, IMO.
As for the English method, i don't get it. If all the things on your plate were meant to be eaten in one bite, the only thing we'd ever eat would be casseroles!
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this is insane... ive been eating like this since i can remember, and my grandfather always commented on it and how i was soooo "european" but didn't really understand til i lately.
but really, right before i read this article i was eating steak, braised cabbage, and roasted potatoes, and incoherently made sure i had a small piece of each for the last bite lol