Folium: International Dining Etiquette Rules via BudgetTravel.com

Posted by LEAF Architect on Friday, March 9, 2012 · Leave a Comment

International Dining Etiquette Rules via BudgetTravel.com

Food and culture are inseparable ideas. They are symbiotic concepts, you cannot embrace one without the other. Learning to love food is learning to love the people who grow, prepare, and consume the food. And for many people, food is the first baby step to learning about different cultures. In the United States we have a unique opportunity to have our cake and eat it too. In my small town we have food options galore. We have noodles prepared by Chinese, Sushi by Japanese chefs, Mexican assembled by entire Hispanic families, a thousand options of Italian, and the bigger the city the bigger the food options. America’s magnetic draw gives us the advantage to change our palettes on a daily basis.

So it might come as a surprise that in many cases we’re probably eating it wrong.

I once saw a man eating Sushi with a fork. The visual effect was.. cacophonous. It was just plan wrong. Food isn’t just sustenance, it’s an experience in consumption. If you eat only to ingest food, you’re doing it wrong.

I’ve linked an article to international dining etiquette. I do so with the idea that this shouldn’t be a lesson in proper manners, elbows off the table and such. I post this article with the idea that eating what the locals eat isn’t anything until you also eat like the locals eat. In the end, what do you have to lose?

Any international faux-pas of your own? Where have you hopelessly embarrassed yourself at the dinner table? Shout out in the comments below!