Eh… I think right-handed would be able to do that. I know I can do that, but then it may be the way I was taught to cut meat. I was imitating my aunt, who is left-handed. Now cutting with the right hand just seems and feels wrong, the left hand is easier for me.
You have been eating that way for many years I assume. If I was to sit down and try cutting with my left hand it’d be the first time in my life so I’d be at a distinct disadvantage.
I can eat desert or soup or cereal with either hand (after all, I use my left for the fork). I use my right due to convention.
Lamia mentioned salad. Yes! It turns out that salad is much easier to eat with chopsticks than a fork: you can grab and eat whatever you please.
Chopsticks, it would seem, are generally regarded as being less barbaric than forks and knives.
Unless it’s a steak or a half chicken, I genrally prefer to use hashi.
Although I kid about the whole shuffling thing, I do my own sort of shuffle. I always keep the fork in my right hand, knife in the left, and hold my food with my right, cut with my left, and eat with my right, no changing utensils. My shuffle comes at the beginning of the meal when I take the fork from the left side of the plate and move it to the right, and the knife from the right side and move it to the left. (oh, and I am right handed, but one of those weirdos that wears my watch on my right hand, also.)
As I write all this, I’m becoming more and more convinced that chopsticks are better.
Well chopsticks have certain advantages. There are a lot of asian noodle dishes that I could eat very easily with chopsticks but in America they are served with a spoon or fork and it is extremely difficult.
But I’m a big fan of large slaps of beef, fish, chicken et cetra so a fork and knife is pretty essential for that.
And soups you cannot really use chopsticks, and to drink it up like you would beverage is barbaric!
Well, it doesn’t work for thick soups like chowder, but what’s the problem of just drinking straight from the bowl for thin soups? No worse than drinking water from a cup.
Being in the US I habitually use the standard utensils, but …
I used to be able to pick up a single grain of rice with chopsticks so they are not at all as awkward as those who have never learned them would believe.
Soup is a little difficult but I think you get a small ladle for that. And besides the only sensible way to handle soup is to drink it just as with other liquids.
What about a thick soup? Or stews? Exactly.
As far as single grains of rice go, when using chopsticks back in my Army travelling days I’d pick up the rice in clumps myself, grain-by-grain eating would take a bit long.
Well, you chopstick the solids and drink the liquid. If it’s too thick to dring then it should be chopstickable.
Ah you jest, eh? The single grain stunt was just showing off.
What about a shrimp bisque? I can guarantee you that consistency wise, it is just bad form to drink it, it would be like trying to drink a bowl of ice cream (which also poses an interesting problem for chopsticks!) and chopsticks would pass through it without bringing much food to your mouth.
I don’t like shrimp bisque and if it’s difficult to eat with chopsticks, so what?
Everyone in Asia uses a spoon too! Typical Chinese place setting is a bowl, spoon and chopsticks.
Some of the above posts implies that chopstick users don’t have spoons as well, which is not the case. Substitute “fork” for “chopsticks” in some of the above soup examples.
I use chopsticks a lot. Great for cooking bacon. If you want to test your ability, pick up two shelled peanuts at a time (skill) or eat an entire chicken leg (strength).
One big slab of meat that is easier to eat with chopsticks is fish. For one thing, you can pick out the bones delicately with chopsticks without using your fingers. Also, it’s easy to pick off pieces of fish, as the meat is very soft.
I once ate a steak with chopsticks by picking up the entire thing and gnawing on it. I was at home, mind. Barbaric eating can be quite fun sometimes.
You eat Western food with Western utensils, and Asian food with Asian utensils.
I’m just as adept with chopsticks as I am with a knife a fork. I love using chopsticks.
I use chopsticks when the food is in bite size chunks.
I use chopsticks fairly often. It has given me the chance to teach my daughter the vocabulary word affectation.
And then there is the utensil that combines the worst aspects of the spoon and fork. Yes, the spork.
Tell me about it. I’m a proud American, but this fork-switching thing is just crazy. As a kid I just refused to do it because it just seemed so stupid to me. Many years later I discovered that I was eating the European way. (And, of course, I’m of an age now that even if I try to cut with my fork in my left hand and my knife in my right, I can’t do it – and I’m a right-hander!).
This is exactly the case. The eating utensil is a critical element of the cuisine, whatever cuisine it is. Food traditions were developed in conjunction with the tools that were available. Therefore, in order to experience the food properly, you have to eat with the correct utensil. That means chopsticks for East Asian food and bare hands for Indian food. Indian food tastes awful when you use a fork. That metallic taste. Ugh.
So how does fried rice fit into the chopsticks equation? The frying usually dries it out so it doesn’t stick together in nice balls like plain rice. So I have the hardest time eating it with chopsticks.
Good question, hlanelee!
I asked basically the same question here once before-
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=132133&highlight=Chopsticks