Continental Style Eating help & Etiquette (school, live, versus)

[OandEMOM]

I am looking for someone in this area to help me teach my children continental style eating (European). My children are visually impaired and at a recent conference it was suggested that VI children eat this way, which I totally agree with. My 3 year old will have to be converted but my almost 2 year old, we will have a fresh start with.

I know the style, I just need some guidance on when and how to specifically introduce the concept. I would greatly appreciate anyone's help and time with this.

Or if anyone knows someone who teaches etiquette and can assist me, that would be great!

Thanks!

[Jenny_B]

What a fabulously interesting post. I learned and adopted the continental style while I lived overseas (I've just returned to the U.S.). I regularly dined with blue-bloods - the sort who went to boarding school and finishing school. I did not want to stand out at the dinner table for my "American" habits, so I put a lot of effort into observing what to do and what not to do.

I am left-handed, so I already used the fork with my left hand and knife with my right. The challenging part was learning how to eat literally everything off the back of my fork! LOL! Of course there is much more to it than that...

I'm certainly not a professional etiquette expert, but I am someone who learned to eat this way and now feel very comfortable with it. Maybe I can give you some email pointers?

I'm curious as to why this is a suggested manner of eating for VI children?

Jenny

[OandEMOM]

Well, what I don't like is them using their fingers to push their food onto their fork/spoon. I want them to blend as much as possible and not stand out anymore then they have to, with cane's etc (when they are adults). So, using the utensils together really eliminates using the fingers to push food or using bread (which they normally teach).

I'm just stuck on when to start it and how best to approach it/amend it for their abilities at this point. Thanks for your help!

[Jenny_B]

Originally Posted by OandEMOM

... So, using the utensils together really eliminates using the fingers to push food or using bread (which they normally teach)....

Egads! My parents would have rapped my knuckles had they ever caught me using bread to push food onto my fork! LOL!

They (especially my father) were quite strict about table manners. I disliked it rather intensely when I was a child, but now I'm grateful. My father always said that you could handle any situation at the dinner table with poise and grace.

I used to torment him by trying to come up with outrageous events that could not possibly be handled politely. He had an answer for every single situation I could ever come up with, and I remember all of them.

That's right.... I know what to do if I'm at dinner and suddenly need to vomit. LOL!

Jenny

[bigdadytid]

American style-use your fork with your dominant hand, set fork down to pick up knife to use with dominant hand and use fork with non dominant hand to hold down the piece being cut, put knife down switch to fork in dominant hand

Continental Style-fork in non dominate hand and knife in dominant hand, eat with fork, hold down food to be cut with fork

the continental style of eating saves range of motion

[dansdrive]

Having lived in Germany for over a year on a business assignment, it was an acquired eating habit to eat with a fork in the left hand ( dominant to me) and the knife in the right hand. I find it much better in controlling the food on my fork. One can easily load the fork with the precision of the knife versus ones fingers, or bread, or whatever one would use to load a fork. To this day I still use both when eating, it was an acquired habit that worked. I remember getting asked by younger family members why I always used both when I ate. My answer was simple, being I spent time on another continent I was certified to be continental and was as such only performing my duty! Please pass the Grey Poupon, please.

[MrsSteel]

OandEMOM, I don't think it's really necessary to hire someone to teach this to your children. If you do a bit of searching on-line you'll probably find plenty of etiquette websites that offer all of the instruction you'll need to teach the children yourself. I wouldn't be at all surprised if there were dining etiquette videos on YouTube that demonstrate the continental dining style. If that doesn't give you helpful results, then a trip to the library should do the trick.

Even if you don't find instruction that's as comprehensive as you'd like, that may be because it's so simple. Most of it is really just as basic as people have described here: knife in right hand & fork in left, held with the tines curving down as it enters your mouth. You simply have to practice to get used to it. The only quirk I can think of is if you're eating something that doesn't come with a knife like, say, a piece of pie. In that case you put the fork in your right hand & eat the same way you would with American style. However, this is according to the rules of etiquette & in the case of your children, we can certainly bend those rules a bit & let them use a knife to eat their pie.