Eating with your hands is the norm in some countries of Southeast Asia like Malaysia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India. It might seem strange for westerners who are used to using utensils, but usually once a visitor tries “hand eating” they really enjoy it and say that the food tastes better!
While cutlery is foundational to Western dining, eating with one's hands is the norm across much of the world, including large swaths of the Middle East, Africa, South Asia, and South America.
Eating with their hands is a spiritual thing for Hindu people. In their religion, they believe that each finger represents one of the five elements. Earth, wind, air, fire, and water all come together to create a better connection with the food. For Muslim people, eating with their hands is also a spiritual act.
The practice of eating with one's hands, specifically your fingers, originated within Ayurvedic teachings, where it is believed that our bodies are in sync with the five elements of nature and each finger is an extension of one of these five elements.
East African cuisine has the injera (flatbread), a piece of which is broken and eaten with hands after rolling sauce into it. Ethiopians have the ritual of gursha — a practice of feeding another with one's hands; the bigger the morsel the greater the friendship.
Māori traditionally ate with their hands but incorporated Pākehā utensils and equipment into their eating practices in the 19th century. Here a man called Watikini is eating a potato with one hand but grasping a spoon in the other.
Eating with your hands is the norm in some countries of Southeast Asia like Malaysia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India. It might seem strange for westerners who are used to using utensils, but usually once a visitor tries “hand eating” they really enjoy it and say that the food tastes better!
As in the west, using your fingers to eat is frowned upon at formal Chinese diners. But it is okay to hold your bowl close to your mouth and use your chopsticks to shovel in food. If you're a guest in a Chinese home, don't be surprised if your host chooses some delicacies for you, whether you want them or not.
While most Filipinos today eat using a spoon and fork, the traditional way of eating is kamayan, or “with hands.” Kamayan was the customary way of eating in the Philippines prior to Spanish colonization in the 16th century, and although utensils are more accessible and common now, Pinoys often eat this old school way ...
Kamayan, or the act of eating food with your hands, is not only a practical way of eating your food (as it eliminates the need to clean spoons and forks), but also a good way of bonding with the locals. It breaks social boundaries, and is seen by most Filipinos as a better way of enjoying your food.
The Arab way of eating was by using your hands. A way that you may call a hand-to-mouth way of eating which is quite rare. Though many may view hands-to-mouth eating as wild, it was and is still is on some occasions a practiced culture for Arabs. However, it is not used for all types of cuisines.
Germans and other Europeans rarely eat with their hands! Especially in a fine restaurant or in a formal/semiformal dining situation, even pizza is eaten with a knife and fork. However, if you are at an outdoor Grillparty or eating informally, it's okay to eat some foods, such as hamburgers or hotdogs, with your hands.
The practice of eating with the hands originated within Ayurvedic teachings. The Vedic people believed that our bodies are in sync with the elements of nature and our hands hold a certain power. Ayurvedic texts teach that each finger is an extension of one of the five elements: Through the thumb comes space.
It is common for Sri Lankans to eat food with their hands. If they encourage you to do so, only use your right hand to hold the food and pass it to your mouth. The left hand is reserved for cleaning or holding the plate you eat from.
Do Thai People Eat With Their Hands? Thai people use our hands to eat some things, most commonly sticky rice because it's so sticky that it's actually easiest to just eat with your hands, and unlike sushi rice, it doesn't stick to your hands!
Use bowl and chopsticks properly
Unlike most of the European and Middle-East countries, Vietnamese use bowl and chopsticks to eat so just by how you use your hands with these two things, people will judge if you are skilful eater or not.
Eating with fingers is not exclusive to South Asia. It is common to eat with one's hand in Ethiopian cuisine, Oaxacan cuisine, and many other regions of the Middle East, Africa, and South America.
The origins of this boil down to the convergence of colonialism and tropical climate. Despite the nation's proximity to China and Japan, chopsticks never took on with the population. The most economical way to eat was kamayan style, or with your hands, straight from a banana-leaf table runner.
First of all, mostly Indonesians use right hand (“muluk”) to eat food. They do that because they believe that food taste better eating with hands as well after eating usually they lick the fingers to show satisfaction of food taste.
People often eat with their hands. Restaurants may not provide utensils but instead place a water pitcher on the table so everyone can wash their hands before using them to eat. Always wash your hands before eating or serving food to a Malaysian.
In pre-modern times, this way of eating was also more hygienic because chopsticks' small size minimized the chance of passing one's germ to the food in communal eating. In sum, though invented in antiquity about 7,000 years ago, chopsticks were not always so essential to East Asian table manners as one might think.
Prior to the adoption of the fork, the custom in Europe was for all food to be conveyed to the mouth by the right hand (using a spoon, a knife, or fingers). When the fork was adopted, it followed this rule; it was held in the left hand while cutting and then transferred to the right to eat.
Always use utensils to eat. It is considered polite to finish everything on your plate.
In countries like India, Japan, and China, eating while seated on the floor serves as a habit, ritual, and wellness practice all in one. Resting in Sukhasana, or "easy" pose, forces you to sit taller with every bite, and improves mobility in the hips and ankles.