Do You Know How to Use Chopsticks?

Do you know how to use chopsticks?

  • Yes

    Votes: 44 81.5%
  • No

    Votes: 10 18.5%

  • Total voters
    54

D_Gunther Snotpole

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When I was briefly living in Hong Kong, a Cantonese friend took me out several times for dim sum and gave me a few instructions on chop stick technique.

At that time I had severe carpal tunnel syndrome and I really couldn't manipulate the chop sticks for more than a minute. But my host could do wonderfully dextrous things with them ... easily pick up a very small bean, for example. He said many Chinese never really get the niceties of using them down, and very very few do so before the age of 12 or so. (Of course, every Chinese person can eat serviceably with them.)

Now, for a variety of reasons, I frequently have to eat with chop sticks -- and for that reason as much as any, I had carpal tunnel surgery. The improvement, and the recovery, was instantaneous. Best surgery since my circumcision.:yikes: (On the down side, there's now no obvious place on my person to keep my chop sticks.:tongue:)

I'm not baaaad now. I can eat anything, partly because, as DC notes, it's perfectly polite to bring your bowl to your mouth and scrape food southward, counting on the odd fortuitous avalanche.
 

DC_DEEP

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NIC, no, I'm not certain about Thai utensils. Last time I ate pho, I used the chopsticks as far as possible, then used the big spoon for the broth (Viet Crystal on Metrotech has some good food!)

I have a good bit of dexterity with chopsticks - if I had to, I could pick up individual grains of rice with them. That's tedious, though, and no reason for it, other than to show off. With chopsticks in hand, I'm usually more interested in actually getting the food to my mouth.
 

rawbone8

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I kick ass with chopsticks. One of my Korean friends, while I was in Korea, said that she was constantly berated for holding her chopsticks "like a beggar," and apparently the way I used them was considered more refined. Arbitrary BS in my opinion, but I do know how to use them well and can eat anything from sushi to pho to rice with them.

Most Asian foods are designed with chopsticks in mind, so I've found in general it's easier to eat with chopsticks as opposed to a fork, so long as you know how to use them and have cultivated enough coordination to use that knowledge. Plus it just makes the dining experience more authentic.

DC, are you really sure about the Thai food thing? In Bangkok and Phuket I saw the locals eating with chopsticks all the time. They had large spoons for dividing up the portions, and it's customary to share everything and serve one another, but when it came to eating usually they'd switch to the chopsticks.

My funny story with chopsticks etiquette is from Japan, when a dining companion left their chopsticks sticking straight up from their rice when they got up to use the restroom. Our Japanese hosts were mortified. Apparently this means something like you are offering your food up to the dead... they respect spirits there but generally try to avoid calling their attention.

I can confirm that it is considered extremely uncouth and bad luck to poke one's chopsticks into the food sticking straight up. It looks exactly like incense sticks at a death or memorial ceremony. Chinese, Koreans and Japanese all agree on that.


I use chopsticks every day and am quite proficient. I can "scissor" food into smaller portions with one hand, wrap small nori sheets around a clump of rice in a bowl to make a mouth sized rice-roll, and pick up single beans etc.

As you know NIC, Koreans eat rice with a spoon, unlike Japanese.


Surprisingly, I discovered I am equally dextrous with chopsticks using my left hand as with my right. It was a useful skill whilst feeding my toddler daughter in some sitting arrangements. Even my Korean wife can't do that. (Koreans frown on left-handedness though, so it's not something I can brag about. She'd be smacked if she ate that way at her parent's table).

There. The truth is out. I AM BI. Dextrous. :biggrin1:
 

canuck_pa

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We have a huge vibrant Asian community here with some excellent restaurants. As a rule of thumb, I will only go to Asian restaurants that have chopsticks rather than forks as the food is usually more authentic rather than the westernized stuff. Opps! That sounds like I'm a snob. I'm really not. Authentic restaurants are also usually cheaper.

Chopsticks also make me eat slower which also forces me to relax and enjoy it more.
 

B_Hickboy

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Yes - it's quite simple, you sharpen them to a point and underarm flick them (throwing knife style) at your intended victim. They are a silent, easily concealable and effective weapon.

Oh, and you can eat stuff with them too.

(Of course I can use chopsticks - I'm Irish, we're a cultured bunch these days :tongue:)
I feel so safe when I'm with you.
 

D_Gunther Snotpole

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Yes - it's quite simple, you sharpen them to a point and underarm flick them (throwing knife style) at your intended victim. They are a silent, easily concealable and effective weapon.

In Japan at least (I don't know about other countries) you are not supposed to point your chopsticks directly into the mouth ... always at least slightly from the side.
And the reason for this is supposed to be that, ages ago, scoundrels would watch someone who tended to put the chopsticks directly in and would use their hands, at the propitious moment, to smash the all-too-pointed chopsticks back through the person's spine.
It was then child's play to rob the corpse.
A fun image, I know.
Sorry.
 

got_lost

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Yes I am proficient with chopsticks.
Learnt from an early age and will always use them in restaurants and for takeaways, when eating Chinese, Japanese or Thai...

Though to be fair don't each much japanese anymore... over-dosed on sashumi in Tokyo and it was the last straw when they gave it to me for breakfast, along with tofu and other odd non-breakfast foods... that being after a nights sleep on a thin mattress on a floor with a pillow full of marbles... I say sleep... didn't do much of that... dozed off about 5 mins right before my alarm went off....
:(
 

earllogjam

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In Japan at least (I don't know about other countries) you are not supposed to point your chopsticks directly into the mouth ... always at least slightly from the side.
And the reason for this is supposed to be that, ages ago, scoundrels would watch someone who tended to put the chopsticks directly in and would use their hands, at the propitious moment, to smash the all-too-pointed chopsticks back through the person's spine.
It was then child's play to rob the corpse.
A fun image, I know.
Sorry.

I remember learning chopstick etiquette from a Japanese professor in college. I don't remember him saying anything about pointing the chopsticks directly in the mouth but I do remember him saying that the chopsticks should never touch any part of your mouth or lips. It's probably all related. Sucking on them is strictly verboten so is picking your teeth, using them to mix or stir drinks or using them in your hair. When picking food from a shared platter on the table you need to reverse them and pick the food with the butt end of your chopsticks and always place it on your plate instead of directly into your mouth. Using your left hand is considered a sign of poor upbringing. In a family table everyone has their own designated chopsticks so don't just use any. Most guests are given brand new ones. They are very into keeping the purity of things and sneezing and blowing your nose at the table is considered very very rude. Pouring your own beer is also not done. Who knew it was so involved! Fortunately gringos don't need to follow these rules but if you are Japanese it is expected etiquette.
 

Drifterwood

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I tend to hold them a little low down and my hands are a bit too big for the small traditional metal Korean chopsticks.

The Thais use a spoon and fork by Royal decree, so I was told. Same in the Philippines, I think.
 

PussyWellington

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Yes, I can use chopsticks very well as I have spent five years living in Asia. I learnt on the metal Korean ones, which in my opinion are the most challenging to use with the wooden disposable ones being the easiest.

I, like Rawbone, can cut and seperate food with them and I guess I could peel an egg with them if I had to. I have also eaten pizza and fruit using them. I use them a lot when cooking, and if I am at home I prefer to eat pasta with them.
 

headbang8

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Yes, I can use chopsticks very well as I have spent five years living in Asia. ... have also eaten pizza and fruit using them. I use them a lot when cooking, and if I am at home I prefer to eat pasta with them.

I lived in Japan for five years, and there are still things I prefer to eat with chopsticks. Lettuce, for example.

Like NIC160, I got complemented on my chopstick technique when I arrived in the East. Most likely because westerners learn the "official" way, while locals pick up the slang way to use chopsticks as kids.

(I guess it's like learning a foreign language. If you do it as an adult, and succeed, you're likely to speak all posh-like, rather than using your own personal shortcuts and regional dialect)

Many Asians of my acquaintance--especially Cantonese--apologise for their chopstick technique. They have a bizzare way of holding them between middle and ring finger which strikes me as totally unfunctional, but it seems to work. I note that the southern Chinese use a spoon much more often than many other chopstick-wielding cultures, Koreans included.

My Japanese other-half, though, is a total snob about table manners (and everything else, BTW). Faced with a dozen grains of rice at the bottom of a bowl, he can clean them up in a matter of seconds by, in quick succession, picking up each grain individually. (He may need to do this a lot, soon, since it's hard to find clumpy rice in Europe)

It strikes me that the same happened to me with the knife and fork many years ago.

I learned my table manners in Pittsburgh as a kid (no jokes, please). My family moved to Austarlia when I was a teen, where I everyone uses cutlery in the continental fashion, i.e. where you keep your fork in your left hand, turn it upside-down, and pile food on the back, vs. cutting up your food, transferring the fork to your right hand, and using the fork like a spoon to pick up the pieces.

The first time I ate dinner at a friend's house in Australia, he joked that it was a pity my mother wasn't there to cut up my meat for me. Only a child, it seems, uses his fork as a spoon.

So, I soon learned the contintal way to use cutlery by observation. And did it properly, so now you can ask me confidently to a French restaurant, in France, even.

Since travelling and living in Europe, I notice that local cutlery usage can be as sloppy as the Cantonese with chopsticks. Bavarians and Yorkshiremen, particularly. When resting between bites, they seem to twist the fork and knife so they face upward toward one's dinner companion, and arrange the cut-up bits with their knives on an upturned fork in the left hand. I have never seen this done in places like France or Italy, where etiquette-fascists hold sway.

ON the other hand, when living in America recently, I discovered I'd forgotten US table etiquette. Americans right-fork their food delicately, and with great skill. When trying to eat in the American fashion, I could never quite clean my plate, while my companions would be able to pick up their last pea.

Getting back to the subject...

I think Earllogjam has a point. Food is an easy and fun way to broaden your cultural horizons. And sophistication about other cuisines is a pretty good indicator that you're in a pink-neck place.

My brother and sister-in law were travelling in eastern Europe about fifteen years ago. They got a bit sick of getting protien through schnitzel and fibre through chewy brown bread. When they saw a Vietnaese restaurant in Prague, they leapt on the chance to get some real, lightly cooked, vegetables.

My bro and his wife made a great fuss of insisting on chopsticks. Their table was in the window facing the street, and soon, much to their delight, they had an audience.

I wonder if the same would happen today?

HB8

P.S. the chopsticks in the rice bowl...it's a custom at funerals to stick a pair of chopsticks in a rice bowl, straight up. They belong to the deceased, and symbolise his presence at the table. They point straight up because he's in heaven, of course. I suspect that in the absence of a known soul putting them to use, they will act as a lightning rod for any restless soul wandering along looking for some poor folks to spook.