Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1882-09-01
HOW AMERICANS EAT.
An EnglIshnau Crlticlzes the Way We
Eat In the Far West.
lsan Francisco Letter to the New York world.I

Eat III tne Far WeUs
[san Francisco Letter to the New York worldl
Tt was the Ogden rcfreshment room
waiting for the train for San Francisco
that saw performance that filled M,
with astonishment and dismay. 1t was
man eating his dinner. And let me her,
remark, with all possible courtesy, tina
the American is the most reprehensibl,
eater have ever seen. In the first place
the knives are purposely made blunt
the back and the front Of the blade being
often of the same sharpness" to enable
him to eat gravy with it. The result i,
that the fork (Which ought to be uset
simply to hold the meat steady on the
plate while being cut with the knife) ha,
to be used with force to wrench off frag
ments of food. The object of the two
instruments is thus materially abused
for he holds the meat down with the knife
and tears it into bits with his fork
Now, reader, don't say no. For l have
been carefully studying Americans a,
their food (all over the West at any rate,
and what say is strictly correct This
abuse of knife and fork, then necesstates
IN extraordinary amount of elbow room,
for in forcing apart a tough slice of beef
the elbows have to stick out MS square as
possible, and the consequence is, as the
proprietor of n hotel told me, only foui
Americans can eat in space in which six
Englismen will dine comfortably The
latter when feeding keep their elbows to
their sides; the former square them out
Oh line with their shoulders and at
right angles to their sides. The Ameri-
can orders dozen "pottions" of as many
eatables, and the whole of his meal, after
the filthy fashion of the "eating- houses
at which travellers are fed, is put before
him at once. To eat the dozen or so
only one knife and fork and one teaspoon.
into picked gherkin, and while MUNICH
ing this casts one rapid, hawk-like
glance over the spread viands, and then
proceeds to eat Meherculc ! what II
sight it is He dabs his knife into the
gravy of the steak and picks up with his
fork IL piece of bacon. While the one is
going up to his mouth the other is reach
ing ont for something else. He never
apparently chews his food, but dabs and
pecks at the dishes one after the other
with rapidity which merely as a Jug
Cling trick might be performed in Lon
don to crowded houses every day, and m
that considered us "dining,"
is as savage as any meal of red Indians or
of liasutos. Dab-dab, peck-peck, erunt,
growl and snort The spoon strikes in
every now and then, and quick, suck
ing-up noise announces the disappearance
of a mouthful of huckleberries on the
top of o bit of bacon, or spoonful of
custarl pie on the heels OF radish. 1t
is perfectly proligious. 1t deties coher-
ent description. But how on earth does
he swallow it Every now and then he
shuts his eyes and strains his throat. This
| suppose is when he swallows, for have
seen children getting rid of cake with the
same sort of spasm. Yet the rapidity
with which he shovels in his food is Won
der to me, seeing that he has not got any
"pouch" like the monkey or the pelican.
Does he keep his miscellaneous food in a
crop" like pigeon, or preliminary
stomach like n COW, and "chew the cul"
Mt his leisure? confess / am
beaten by it. The mixture of his food
if it pleases him, does not annoy me for
if n man likes to eat mouthfuls of huckle-
berries, bacon, apple pie, picked mack
erel, peas, mutton, gherkins, oysters,
radishes, tomatoes. custard and poached
eggs (this is bona fde meal, copied
from my note book on the spot) ind is
criminate confusion, it has nothing to do
with me.