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Jul 12, 06
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Essay 1 of 2: Knorkin on Heaven's Door - The history of Cutlery
Im bored at work so I wrote some essays about things. here's one on cutlery:
INTRO ===== A long time ago, people decided they were too hoity toity to use their hands to eat food. What, you say, that's impossible, as many people today eat sandwiches, chicken strips, and even cheerios using their bare hands. That's because society's gone downhill, but back in our glory days, people couldn't even show an ankle without being called scandaluos. Let's call this era, everything before 1992. And with that, cutlery was used widespread across the globe as a means of getting food into ones mouth. Proposed here is a bit of history and facts on cutlery around the world, their evolution, and de-evolution, and significant cultural change. Or not. HISTORY ======= Cutlery, as mentioned before, got it's kickstart in the hoity toity era of Europe, and it was the Company of Cutlers in Hallamshire (established in 1624, missing Shakespear's death by less than a decade.....random fact! 1616 was his death, no?) Modern day cutlery primarily consists of the knife, fork and spoon....except in Australia, where it's dangerous to challenge someone to a game of knifey-spoony without knowing what you're doing. High quality stuff is known as silverware because it's often made with silver, although these days silverware is often left to sit under grandma's bed until her relatives from Europe come over for 'one last visit'. Silverware doesn't get the credit it deserves, ever since the 19th century when people discovered they could electroplate nickel and make durable forks and knives that a) didn't look as pretty and b) were remarkedly cheaper. THE KNORK?!?! ============= This wikipedia also mentiosn the existence of a spork, our long-known loving spoony forky friend, but also let's us aware of the KNORK, a knife and fork combo of who's name should really be tattoo'd onto the lower back of teenaged girls everywhere. The Knork was invented by Mike Miller, now-owner of Phantom Enterprises, a company set up to produce and market his invention (this is true). The reason we probably haven't heard of the KNORK is due to the fact that Mike markets it as a high end utensil, costing almost five dollars per knork (again I'm not making this part up). THE SPORK! ========== The better known Spork, sometimes confused with Spock, who can be found at www.trekpassions.com, originated sometime in the early 1900s as indeed a fork and spoon combination. According to a December 20th 1952 NY times article, a man in PA applied to trademark the spork, however no patent record exists of this. In 1970, a company applied to patent a plastic version of the spork, but never followed through with receiving the patent. NOW COME THE BRITS. In the UK, Plastico Limited registered SPORK as a tm in 1975, which shares a trademark with a garden tool which, has been advised, does not make good cutlery. In 1999, a company called Regalzone sought to "invalidate" Plastico's registration for spork. And i quote: Justice Neuberger wrote: "I accept that the word Spork involves a clever idea of making a single word by eliding the end of the word spoon and beginning of the word fork. The fact that it is clever and the fact that the meaning of Spork could be said to be obvious once it is explained does not mean that it is obvious what it is. Indeed, I would have thought that if one asked a person in 1975 what a Spork was, he or she would not know. If one then explained what it was and how the word came about, one might then be told that it was obvious or that it was clever." There we have it, the Uk is merely obsessive over having creative rights to who is more 'clever'. Today the spork is most commonly seen at KFC's, as used with their tasty tasty coleslaw dish, which began commonplace at the fastfood chain in the 70s. Turns out nobody wanted to sue them, they just kept on giving them chicken. WHAT ABOUT OTHER PLACES ======================= Around the world, they don't believe in the fork, knife, and spoon, because you know, america is the devil. and britain. tony blair, and all that. SO they've wittled up their own pieces of cutlery. here they are: Balti - In indian eating times, the balti (not the balalalalalti, that's for terrorists only) is a large pot divised from the hindu word for "bucket" (tuesday's coming, did you bring your coat?). But this is where Hindi and Urdu gets confusing, because the food itself is balti, but balti is NOT the pot it's cooked in unless you're speaking in Urdu...even though it's a Hindu word. LOL CONFUSING. Basically it's not so much a utentsil but a bowl you eat out of....why it's included in here WHO KNOWS. CHOPPYSTIX - From the land of dragons, and wind and ghosts, comes chopsticks, the asian cutlery preference. And how about that, beacuse really they're the most versatile and simple to craft utensils out there. Food has to be prepared in bite sizes pieces in the first place, removing the unnecessary need to cut food on your plate. While chopsticks are typically wooden in nature, Chinee royalty used to use silver chopsticks which supposedly detected poison in the food as they would blacken due to a chemical reaction. Too many ninjas and samurais trying to seek revenge on their family name, I suppose. Regardless, they were invented about 3,000 to 5,000 years ago, so roughly a thousand year after the earth was made according to some christians....why it took people a thousand years to realize they could use two sticks to eat with is beyond me, but hey, maybe they weren't all hoity toity back int he garden of eden. Speaking of hoity toity, we've all seen those anime where the characters go nuts eating bowls of rice with chopsticks, and scrape the last bits out of the bowl intot he mouth. THIS IS NOT ALLOWED IN KOREA! Not sure if Kim Jong-Ill behavin made this rule or not, but you're supposed to use chopsticks with grace in Korea. Also, wherever you are, never erect chopsticks perfectly vertical in a bowl of rice, this resembles an offering to the dead, and might make people question if you're in Madagascar. The more you know ******* In conclusion today's food seems to be self centered around using hands. Hands are quite close to use at most times, and in all essence, we're not too concerned about cleanliness, or eating KFC coleslaw. 
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Jul 12, 06
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Quote:
in korea it's not considered polite to do so. edit: Quote:
Last edited by wishbone; Jul 12, 06 at 02:14 PM.
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Jul 12, 06
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I think its a bit stretched though. We PREFER spoons over eating rice with chopsticks...but its not entirely unheard of....
Ok yah its a bit strange if you do, but again..........its not a huge thing...as in its NOT ALLOWED and youll get kicked out of restaurants or anything.
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Jul 12, 06
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Hmmm.
Rofl... First ironclad warship in the world. The Korean turtle boat. Revolutionized naval warfare. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turtle_ship
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Jul 12, 06
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Actually, after some moderate discussion with sum korean folk.
There is alot more truth to that than I thought. Korean people dont use chopsticks to eat rice, and also do not lift the bowl. Those are typically chinese traits and we prefer not to follow that trend. Problem is, Im half chinese half korean, so i think i confused myself a bit there. Wizzy is correct, there is a cultural difference.
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