No problems. Well, I was having lunch with mom today when I remembered this thread. It's really pretty simple.

Wow rkkwan, that's very useful how you did the chopsticks instructions! I'm glad I asked. Thank you!

ggreen

So glad.

I think my ideas are based on the Pizza Hut advert from when they first opened over here.

They showed what I think was a US advert with a very English voice over telling us that these people were eating with their hands because they were AMERICANS - said in the tome of voice that implied "they are uncouth but know no better" -and ending with the addition that for Britain Pizza Hut had added a 'refinement' a knife and fork.

rkkwan: thanks for the chopsticks instruction! Now I don't have to slurp rice by raising the plate.

What a relief!

OTOH, I kinda like the idea of a straw, especially those gigantic pearl tea straws...

When Pizza Hut started opening restaurants in Hong Kong in the 80's, they also try to convince its customers to use their fingers. Didn't work, and very soon they give out knives and forks.

[They also had a cheap salad bar. But because Chinese people like to share and save money, they limit customers to one trip only. Well, that became an entertainment/sports for many to see who can put the most stuff in the bowl - with zero interest of actually eating the salad. People extend the wall of the bowl with nicely put together slices of cucumber, and then then just stack layers and layers of stuff into the bowl. Vast amount of food were wasted.

That went on for long long time until they raised the prices significantly, and people got bored with the salad-building. Don't know if they still have salad bar in Hong Kong or not.]

sashh, they do have - and have always had - plastic utensils at even the most rudimentary of take-away pizza places. And a place like Pizza Hut would even resort to actual cutlery on the tables. How funny then that they would persist in the American stereotype to sell a few pies! (as pizza are known here in NYC)

In further contemplation of my personal practices, I would say I eat pizza with fork and knife firstly to avoid dripping (this is especially the case with thinner slices of pizza like a "classic slice" - that NY fold makes a perfect funnel for the melted cheese to slide down!) but also to minimize burning the roof of my mouth!

Sadly, places like Pizza Hut now put <i>so much</i> extra into their pizzas here that it must be a physical impossibility to navigate them without utensils: They advertise what are to me highly unappetizing excesses of food, such as a &quot;meat lovers supreme&quot; on a cheese filled crust, or pizza &quot;sticks&quot; you are expected to dip in creamy salad dressing! www.pizzahut.com/Menu.aspx amp;

To each his own, I guess!

While we're at it, here's the French menu, in case there is anything different on it: http://www.pizzahut.fr/carte.php

For example, what about Vietnamese egg rolls (nems) in a Pizza Hut?

<i>Faites voyager votre palais avec les Nems aux l&eacute;gumes et r&eacute;chauffez vos papilles avec les Chicken Wings : 3 ailes de poulet marin&eacute;es tr&egrave;s tr&egrave;s &eacute;pic&eacute;es. Vivez un moment savoureux et convivial autour des Amuse-bouches : un assortiment de 3 croustillants de poulet pan&eacute;s, 3 croquants de ch&egrave;vre pan&eacute;s et 3 nems aux l&eacute;gumes. Parfait &agrave; partager pour l’ap&eacute;ritif !</i>

Careful, rkkwan, you're making it sound like Hong Kong people ate to excess or went for giant portions. It's a well known fact here on Fodors that ONLY Americans overeat or even have ever seen huge portions of food.

Neo - I think you're referring to the Pizza Hut salad bar thing, right? Well, those people pay for the salad bar to <b>play</b> &quot;salad-building&quot;. They did not eat most of it. That was the really disgusting and tragic part of it.

That may be true on the European board, but anybody who has been to Asia knows that the Chinese can eat twice their weight at every meal. Their intestines may be some sort of M&ouml;bius strip.

(I was reacting to NeoPatrick)

ggreen

Plastic? Plastic! PLASTIC!!!!!!!!!

Actually a couple of years ago my parents took a wedding anniversary trip to NY - from my mum's account she spent half the trip looking for coffee in a proper cup and saucer. Apart from that they had a fantastic time but if you mention NY to her she goes on about coffee in polystyrene cups and follows it up with how even that was called Styrofoam.

sashh - yeah right?! Believe me, living in this country, I know from plastic. Imagine trying to spear a slippery bite of pizza with a fork so wobbly the tines practically melt along with the cheese!!

...I <i>am</i> talking about the places that are primarily take-away, where the shop interior is on par with the cutlery. There are certainly better facilities available - in any one of the Top NYC pizza places mentioned on these boards, you'll see nary a paper plate, plastic utensil nor styrofoam cup in the place. But take-away is at the root of our lifestyle, I'm afraid, and with it disposable everything.

I am happy to report that, at least in the Northeast, we have greatly reduced the use of styrofoam cups (and yes, like kleenex, we use the brand name to describe the generic!). That nasty stuff does a terrible job at disintegrating so our landfills are full of it. Not to mention it overinsulates the coffee, and IMO makes it taste funny! So we have coated cardboard instead LOL.

Your mum would probably love my local coffee shop, complete with cups and saucers, coffee, chocolate and tea. Then again, it's run by an Irishman and looks like it was dropped in from France - so the European influence might have something to do with it!

But rkkwan, I'm thinking your mom would not ever be seen pushing rice into her mouth. Just a guess here.

Ah the fodor gods - who can fathom their reasoning.

The couscous thread has been moved to the Lounge where everyone is describing it as a side dish and this thread remains in Europe where we are talking about eating cantonese style.

ggreen

Well my mum is about to inherit some money from her great aunt (the funeral was only last week) so maybe she'll visit.

She's a tea drinker, but i'm equally fussy about coffee. I hate Costa - they do 150 different drinks they call coffee but ask them what country their coffee is from they will give you a blank stare.

Sarvowinner

But if we were discussing how to eat couscous with a knife and fork it would be here in Europe.

Sashh
(Hitting my forehead with my open palm) Of course - I should have realised!

Sarvowinner, here you go:


Your post from yesterday was probably the funniest thing I've read in weeks! Must've tickled my funnybone: it really did have me laughing out loud.

sashh, as a tea drinker, how did your mum survive the states?? We don't have many places that have a good English tea on the menu...

And I'm with you on the coffee, too!

www.fodors.com/forums/smileys

You can get good coffee in the States, but you need to look for a small independent coffee shop, ignore the Starbucks! I'm really lucky, I have two independents within a five minutes drive, both with good coffee (one roasts their own beans), comfy chairs, and actual ceramic cups. Even growing up the UK, I never developed a taste for tea (heresy, I know), but now I drink white tea I buy over the 'net.

ggreen

My mother and tea

Well where the rest of us breathe air and utilise oxygen my mum lives on having a moan. Being able to moan will have kept her going and i'm sure she took teabags and a mini water heater (she once set fire to a hotel carpet in France with one)

thursdaysd

I was born and brought up here. At my parent's house the kettle is boiled first thing in the morning and the pot never gets chance to go cold.

Still I rarely drink tea. There are some of us who are coffee fans. When I do drink tea it's earl grey without milk. Which means when my mum visits i only ave &quot;that funny tea&quot; - something else to moan at.