“No uncooked joints on the table!“ would ring my mother’s shrill mantra at every mealtime. That was set in stone alongside not playing with your food or eating with your mouth open; no slurping, smacking or crunching permitted under any circumstances. Yet leading scientists are now encouraging us to ditch the culinary diktats imposed by our parents and abandon all allegiance to the etiquette of the dining table.
While the thought of open mouthed mastication may seem repulsive, Professor Spence of the University of Oxford insists that eating in this manner enhances the enjoyment of every mouthful of a meal, and is much akin to the methods employed for beer or wine tasting. It allows more of the flavoursome compounds in food; esters, ketones, terpenoids and aldehydes, to reach the back of the nose. In turn this stimulates the olfactory sensory neurons which connect directly to the brain and heightens our pleasure.
Spence also notes that the sounds generated by eating open mouthed add further relish to the experience. “When it comes to sound we like noisy food- think crunchy, crispy. Both crisps and apples are rated more pleasurable when the sound of the crunch is amplified. To best hear the crunch of an apple, a potato crisp, a carrot stick, a cracker, crispbread or a handful of popcorn, we should also ditch our manners and eat with our mouths open”.
Interestingly, eating in this manner brings its own health benefits too. Put simply, if you eat with your mouth open you chew more effectively, this in turn helps to break down larger pieces of food into smaller particles. Less stress is therefore placed on the oesophagus and this helps the stomach to metabolize your food. Thorough chewing also releases plenty of saliva, which contains digestive enzymes. When released into the throat and stomach these enzymes aid the digestive process.
A more hedonistic attitude to the social norms of the dinner table has been embraced in the hereto unlikely arena of fine dining. Both Heston Blumenthal of The Fat Duck and René Redzepi of Noma, Copenhagen, who boast three Michelin stars apiece, have experimented with dishes designed to be eaten only with the hands. The two starred Mugaritz restaurant in San Sebastian went for a whole season without offering cutlery with any of their dishes.
Professor Spence has worked closely with Blumenthal and believes that touching and feeling our food enhances our anticipation and enjoyment of it. “This can be extended to the feeling of grains of salt sticking to the fingers when eating French fries or the sugary residue of buttercream on a hand after picking up and biting into a slice of birthday cake” he says. By kicking the eating irons into touch and using our hands as utensils like our cavemen ancestors, did he believes that we can elevate our eating experience. “Our sense of touch is also vital in our perception of food on the palate”. When you eat with your hands the fingers send sensors to the brain, essentially it’s a communication pathway.
In Asia of course, this is nothing new. Take a look at the culinary traditions of India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Africa, The Middle East and even Mexico. The practice dates back over 5000 years and has its origins in Ayuverdic principles. It is widely believed that when you touch food with your hands you form a physical and spiritual connection with it. Mindfulness comes into play too, the temperature of the food, how much to pick up and how to hold it. Eastern cultures are far more attuned to the connection between mind and body.
Modern science underpins these ancient beliefs. Our bodies are host to flora which is found not only in our throat, mouth, intestine and gut but also on our hands. When we eat with our hands these friendly flora protect our digestive systems from harmful bacteria and stimulate the digestive system. Certain research has concluded that eating with the hands promotes a greater feeling of satiety than eating with cutlery and can therefore be a useful tool in weight loss. It is also cited that we eat more quickly when using cutlery, faster eating has been linked to blood sugar imbalances in the body which can lead to the development of type-2 diabetes. We will eat more slowly and mindfully by abandoning the knives and forks.
Feeling brave enough to step out of the straightjacket of conventional culinary etiquette and experiment? Let me applaud you. Just one caveat- don’t try it with soup!
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Kumud Gandhi is a Nutritional Food Scientist bestselling Author, Broadcaster, and Keynote Speaker on the subject of nutritional health for productivity & performance in the workplace. In 2010 Kumud founded ‘The Cooking Academy’ a cookery school that focusses on cooking for nutritional health and wellbeing. Kumud regularly presents to international audiences on a variety of topics such as ‘Eating for Immunity and a Lifetime of Wellness’. She is an expert in the field of Wellness in the Workplace and works with organizations to create transformational change in employee health & well-being through nutrition and health coaching.
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