hand to mouth

Is eating with your hands playing with your food? And if it is, is that a bad thing?

Why is it that we feel so socially bound to use cold metal instruments as intermediaries between our hands and our mouths? We never used to; primitive man ate like an animal, using fingers as forks and teeth as knives. It shows more respect to the food, doesn’t it, to caress it rather than poke it.

There are many cultures in which bread is used to ferry the meal from the table to the mouth: Mediterraneans use pita bread pockets to ladle their food, Indians use naan, Ethiopians their sponge-like injera, and even Mexico’s tortillas are used to scoop beans and stews. And we are good at using bread to make a portable meal: burgers and sandwiches, even pies in their pastry cases, are all popular and convenient. Handy.

The more I think about it the more practical eating with your hands seems to be. If you used your hands to eat you could take the food apart carefully, picking out the choicest bits and feeling where the gristle or fat was lurking. I am sure if I flaked apart the flesh of a fish with my hands I’d hardly ever puncture my cheek with bone. And I’d never burn my tongue.

Eating should be a sensual experience: the first taste is with the eyes, the appetite is enhanced by the smell and we should be able to savour the texture of our food before we pulp it.

I think we should go back to a more natural state: recycle, run barefoot, touch your food. If you can handle that…