To a great extent, eating western food means eating emotional appeal: marble fireplace, glittering crystal lamp, silver candlestick, colorful wine and people's elegant and charming manners, which is a touching oil painting in itself. In order to master your manners more skillfully when you taste western food for the first time, it is worthwhile to spend some time familiarizing yourself with these dining etiquette.
When sitting, keep your body straight, don't put your elbows on the table, don't tilt your feet, and keep a certain distance from the table to facilitate the use of tableware. Don't fiddle with the tableware on the dining table. Fold the napkin in half and gently put it on your knee.
* When eating with a knife and fork, take the knife and fork from the outside to the inside, with a fork in your left hand and a knife in your right hand; When you cut something, you hold the fork in your left hand and the food in your right hand, and then cut it into small pieces with a knife, and then send it to your mouth with a fork. When using a knife, the blade should not be outward. When eating, put down the knife and fork in a figure of eight and put them on the edge of the plate respectively. The blade is pointed at yourself, indicating that you will continue to eat. After eating each dish, put the knife and fork together on the plate. If you are talking, you can hold the knife and fork. When you don't use a knife, you can also hold a fork in your right hand, but if you need to make gestures, you should put down your knife and fork, never wave it in the air with your hands, never wipe your mouth with a napkin in one hand, and never hold a glass with a fork in the other. Remember, never put one end of the knife and fork on the plate and the other end on the table.
* Don't eat too much food at a time. Don't talk while chewing, and don't take the initiative to talk to people.
have a meal
After being seated, the host greeted him and began to eat.
Don't overeat when eating. Finish the food on the plate. If it is not enough, you can take it again. If the waiter divides the dishes, if necessary, the waiter will take them when delivering them. If I can't eat or don't like the food, don't refuse it when the waiter serves it or the host takes it. Put a small amount on the plate and say, "Thank you, that's enough." Don't look embarrassed about those bad dishes.
Eat gracefully. Shut up and chew, don't drink soup, and don't make any noise when eating. If the soup and vegetables are too hot, wait until they are cold. Don't blow them with your mouth. Don't spit out the fishbones and bones in your mouth directly. Cover your mouth with a napkin and take it out by hand (chopsticks can be used to eat Chinese food), or spit it gently with a fork and put it on the plate.
Leftovers and used tableware toothpicks should be put on the plate, not on the table.
Don't talk with food in your mouth.
Cover your mouth with your hand or napkin when picking your teeth.
Talk to each other
No matter the host, guest or guest, you should talk to the people at the same table, especially the neighbors. Don't talk to only a few acquaintances or only two people. If you don't know your neighbor, you can introduce yourself first.
take a drop
As a guest of honor, when attending a banquet held in a foreign country, you should know each other's toasting habits, that is, why and when to toast, so as to make necessary preparations. When clinking glasses, the host and guest touch first, and many people can raise their glasses at the same time, not necessarily clinking glasses. Be careful not to cross glasses when toasting. When the host and guest make speeches and toasts, they should stop eating and talking, pay attention to listening, and don't take this opportunity to smoke. Stand still while playing the national anthem. After the host and guests talk and clink glasses with the distinguished guests, they usually go to other tables to propose a toast. In this case, they should stand up and raise their glasses. When clinking glasses, greet each other visually.
It is friendly and lively to toast each other at the banquet, but remember to drink too much. Drinking too much is easy to get rude, even rude, so I must control it within one-third of my alcohol consumption.
Take off your coat.
In social occasions, no matter how hot the weather is, you can't unbutton your clothes in public. At an informal small dinner party, if the host invites the guest to take off his coat, the male guest can take off his coat and put it on the back of the chair.
tea
If you want to drink tea or coffee, you can add milk and sugar to the cup yourself. After stirring with a small teaspoon, the teaspoon is still put back in the saucer. Usually, milk and sugar are put in different containers. When drinking, hold the cup handle in your right hand and the saucer in your left hand.
eat soup
You can't smoke and drink. Scoop the soup from back to front with a spoon, put the bottom of the spoon on the position of the lower lip, and send the soup to the mouth. The angle between the spoon and the mouth is preferably 45 degrees. The upper body leans forward slightly. There is not much soup left in the bowl. You can raise the bowl a little with your fingers. If the soup is in a bowl with a grip, you can drink it directly with the grip.
fruit
When eating pears and apples, don't bite them all. First cut them into four or six petals with a fruit knife, then peel and core them with a knife, and then eat them with your hands. When peeling, the knife edge goes inward and cuts inward from the outside. Peel the banana first and cut it into small pieces with a knife. Oranges are cut into pieces with a knife, and oranges, lychees and longan can be peeled and eaten. The rest, such as watermelon and pineapple, are generally peeled and cut into pieces, and can be cut into small pieces with a fork when eating.
Hydroponics
At the banquet, when chicken, lobster and fruit are served, sometimes a small water bowl (copper basin, porcelain bowl or crystal glass jar) is served, with rose petals or lemon slices floating on the water for washing hands (someone once mistakenly thought it was a drink and made a joke). When washing, wet your fingers with your hands in turn, rinse them gently, and then dry them with napkins or small towels.
Commemorative items
Some hosts will give each attendee a small souvenir or a flower. At the end of the banquet, the host asked the guests to bring it over. In this case, you can say a word or two of praise to this small gift, but you don't have to express your gratitude seriously. Sometimes, foreign tourists often take away banquet menus as souvenirs, and sometimes ask guests to sign the menus as souvenirs. Don't take away all kinds of entertainment items, including candy, fruit, cigarettes, etc. Unless the owner specially indicates it as a souvenir.
Express gratitude/gratitude
Sometimes, after attending a private banquet, I often send a memo or business card to express my gratitude.
Take food from a buffet dinner or cocktail party. When the waiter serves the food, don't rush to get it. Send it to me and get it again. When people around you don't get the first copy, don't rush to get the second copy. Don't stand around the food table, just stand back and let someone else take it.
Use of tableware
Chinese tableware is mainly bowls and chopsticks, while western food is knives, forks and plates. Foreigners are usually invited to eat Chinese food, which is mostly eaten in the west. Chopsticks and knives and forks are set. The use of a knife and fork is to hold a knife in your right hand and a fork in your left hand, cut the food into small pieces and then send it to your mouth with a fork. Europeans don't change hands when using, that is, they hold the fork in their left hand from cutting to feeding. After cutting, the Americans put down the knife and took the fork in their right hand to the food entrance. Take it from outside to inside in the order of knife and fork when eating. After eating each dish, put the knife and fork together on the plate to show that you have finished eating. If you haven't finished eating, put it in a figure of eight or a cross, and the knife edge should be inward. When eating chicken and lobster, the owner can tear it with his hand when he signals, otherwise he can cut the meat with a knife and fork and cut it into small pieces to eat. When cutting meat with bones or hard shells, the fork must firmly hold the meat, and the knife should be cut close to the fork edge to avoid slipping. When cutting vegetables, be careful not to hit the plate too hard and make a noise. Foods that are not easy to fork, or foods that are not easy to fork, can be gently pushed onto the fork with a knife. Eat without a spoon except for soup. Soup is served in a deep plate or a small bowl. When drinking, scoop it up from the inside out with a spoon and put it in your mouth. When you finish eating, you can lift the plate out slightly. Eat fishy food, such as fish, shrimp, game, etc. Add lemon. You can squeeze out the juice by hand and drop it on the food to remove the fishy smell.
The basic principle is to hold a knife or spoon in your right hand and a fork in your left. If there are more than two, you should take them from the outermost one in turn. The way to hold a knife and fork is to gently hold the tail end and press the index finger on the handle. The spoon can be held with a pen. If you feel inconvenient, you can change your right hand to hold the fork, but it is impolite to change it frequently. When eating big vegetables, you can fold and cut them with a knife and fork. Soft food can be put on a fork and arranged with a knife.
Encounter an unexpected situation
In the banquet, if something unusual happens due to carelessness, for example, the knife and fork hit the plate too hard and make a noise, or the tableware fell to the ground, or the drink spilled, and so on. You should be calm and don't worry. When the tableware makes a noise, you can gently say "sorry" to your neighbor (or your host). If it is dropped, the waiter can send a set of tableware. Apologize if the wine spills on the neighbor and help dry it; If the other person is a woman, just hand me a clean napkin or handkerchief and dry it yourself.
Share and enjoy * * *
Whether vegetarians like it or not, according to research, in ancient times, people lived together to enjoy the food brought by sharing meat with each other. When eating, if it is only plants-vegetables, fruits, etc. He can enjoy it by himself and won't worry about other creatures coming to rob him, so everyone won't get together. Only meat as a staple food will attract many people together. At this point, there is not much difference between human and animal worlds. And as long as there is meat to eat, people will not give in to each other, and everyone must compete with each other, so we should share and enjoy. Of course, this is inseparable from everyone hunting at that time and sharing the fruits of victory after returning. Therefore, eating meat is an important event for our human groups to sit together and share the fun of life.
After mankind mastered the use of fire, history turned a new page. Man and beast are completely separated. Everyone forms a circle face to face and enjoys eating and drinking together. In the long years, people have gradually mastered some skills, cooking techniques have been continuously improved, the means of enjoying food have been continuously increased, and the ways and means of eating have begun to be further understood and improved. This social interaction caused by eating has gradually turned into enjoying delicious food, which has become a common form of people's communication and one of the necessary contents of life. People don't just eat to eat. Gourmet parties have become a common way to get in touch, get together and make friends.
This form of * * * meal has promoted the development of interpersonal relationships. Enjoy every dinner, and consolidate the collective life. After dinner, they went back to their respective homes, that is to say, the table and bed began to separate obviously. If anyone is not invited to a family gathering, a family gathering or a village gathering, it is like being expelled from school. Therefore, dinner is not only to understand hunger, but also to prove that you belong to this group, and more importantly, to promote communication between people in the group. No one can make a living just by eating. Everyone needs to get in touch with others, whether they are relatives, friends or business partners. Therefore, ancient festivals were not just about distributing food to hungry people to tide over the difficulties. On the contrary, wealth enables us to hold festivals and parties.
Over time, * * * dining together also urges everyone to abide by certain rules. Etiquette has gradually formed into a norm and discipline that everyone must abide by, and the birth of table manners is not difficult to understand. If everyone wants to have the opportunity to share with others in the group, he must also find his own suitable position in this group, that is, he is entitled to enjoy it. In a group, there are phenomena of different ages and sexes. We can say that there is no other communication occasion that pays more attention to social status than the specific environment of the dining table. Everyone sitting at the table should properly show the behaviors and practices required by his position and status, so as to be accepted by the society and be called a "civilized" person.
It is precisely because of the existence of discipline and rules that it brings stability and security to society. In other words, everyone should act according to the wishes of society and accept the constraints of etiquette. Treat people according to social norms, that is, if he is civilized and polite, he will be accepted by society.
Mr. Koenig *(Knigge, 1752 ~ 1796) said in his book Communicating with People that personal expression is not a private matter, but the expression of human nature in social ethics. Etiquette is not an empty rule, but a kind of respect for others and a manifestation of human civilization. Some table manners now mainly come from his theory or the norms and etiquette established in his thoughts.
* Adolf (Friedrich Ludwig)
1752 65438+ 10/6 was born in a small town near Hanover, Germany, and died in Bremen on May 6th. 1796. From 65438 to 0769, he began to study law in G? ttingen. Working in different departments of state organs, especially in the National High Court, provided him with opportunities and conditions to further explore the relationship between people and provided many valuable materials for his writing. He has devoted himself to writing since he was a young man, among which his masterpiece "Communicating with People" (published by 1788) and his novel "A Journey to Brunswick" (1792) have great influence on later generations. In his book "Communicating with People", he said that personal expression is not a private matter, but the expression of human nature in social ethics. Etiquette is not an empty rule, but a kind of respect for others and a manifestation of human civilization. Some table manners now mainly come from his theory or the norms and etiquette established in his thoughts.