We have all heard of pizzagate, wherein Bill de Blasio was caught eating pizza with a knife and fork. Considering all the wrath that was heaped upon Donald Trump and Sarah Palin for doing the same thing three years ago, one might have thought he would have known better. Thus it was that on the Daily Show Monday night, Jon Stewart called Mayor de Blasio out on this faux pas, and taught him how pizza should be eaten: with one’s hands.
Food that can be eaten with one’s hands—pizza, tacos, hamburgers, French fries, chicken—is fun-food. There is something phony about people who would eat fun-food with utensils, when everyone else uses his hands. They are like people who speak hypercorrectly, saying things like, “I feel badly” or “just between you and I,” trying so hard to speak properly that they get caught using bad grammar and sounding pretentious at the same time. By the same token, there is such a thing as being hypercorrect when it comes to etiquette, trying so hard to behave properly that one ends up doing the wrong thing and looking stilted to boot. Politicians may be tempted to eat pizza with a knife and fork, because they want to avoid pictures being snapped of them looking funny while taking a bite out of a slice of pizza, but eating it with one’s hands is the lesser of two evils.
The issue regarding when it is proper to touch one’s food and when it is not is fairly easy to settle. When it comes to the matter of touching other people’s food, however, there seems to be far more disagreement. You see, while Jon Stewart was instructing His Honor about the proper etiquette of touching one’s own slice of pizza, he committed his own breach of etiquette by touching the slice that de Blasio was supposed to eat. When this video was shown on Morning Joe on Tuesday, Mika Brzezinski posed the question, “If I picked up a slice of pizza and handed it to you, would you eat it?” to each of the men at the table. They all said that they would. She also asked if they would mind. And that is a totally different question.
It is rude to touch someone else’s food. However, since it is bad manners to make someone feel bad by calling attention to his bad manners, a lot of people who would indeed mind that she touched their food would nevertheless eat it to keep from making her feel bad. They would pretend not to mind, because their manners are better than hers. On the other hand, since she was not serving pizza, but raising the question concerning the etiquette of touching someone else’s food, it would have been proper for any of the men to say they would mind, if they did, but none of them did so.
Thomas Roberts said that he would not mind, because she was clean. But that is beside the point. Germs may be a reason to be chary of touching food, but they are an independent reason. Television doctors regularly tell us that if we wish to avoid catching a cold or getting the flu, we should wash our hands thoroughly. Some viruses can live a long time on doorknobs, bannisters, tables, and the like, and thus before one picks up a slice of pizza, it behooves one to wash one’s hands first. And so, if Mika were to serve me a slice, I would hope that she washed her hands first for the same reason. But even if her hands are clean, she should serve pizza with a utensil, or let people retrieve their own slice from the plate.
John Heilemann answered with a different non sequitur, pointing out that the people in the kitchen touch your food while they are preparing it. Here too, we must distinguish between germs and etiquette. Germwise, we certainly hope that the people in the kitchen have washed their hands before preparing our food, but I threw my rose-colored glasses away a long time ago. Some people are clean, and some people are not, and one must exercise judgment in this regard.
I once knew a couple who invited me over to play cards on a regular basis, and this would sometimes include dinner. They were not clean. At first, I would eat the food that the wife’s unclean hands had touched out of sheer politeness, but when I saw her dip pieces of raw chicken into a container of seasoning, and then put what was left of the seasoning back in the cabinet to be used again in the future, I drew the line. I am willing to do a lot of things for the sake of courtesy, but coming down with salmonella is not one of them.
From then on, I made the excuse that I had eaten just before I came over, and thus was too full to partake of their fare. She was a little disappointed, because she was proud of her cooking, but she accepted the excuse. A few weeks later, while visiting them, I asked if I could have a glass of water, and the husband told me I could help myself. I took a glass down from the cabinet, filled it with water, and took a big old swig. Involuntarily, I did a projectile spew all over kitchen. “What are you trying to do, kill me!?” I hollered.
“Oh,” he said, apologetically. “We sprayed the cabinets for roaches today. We meant to wash the dishes when we were through, but we forgot.”
From then on, I not only ate before I went over, I filled up on water as well.
In any event, germs (and, I suppose, poison) may be a reason to be concerned about what happens in the kitchen, but etiquette is another matter. Regarding the latter, it is perfectly proper for people to touch the food while they are preparing it in the kitchen. Only when it is brought from the kitchen and set upon the table is it rude to touch someone else’s food. And yet, since two wrongs do not make a right, if someone touches your food, etiquette requires that you eat it as if you didn’t mind one bit.
Another reason to eat the food that another has touched is to present a face to the world that others will respect. Mika said that the husband of a couple she knows takes exception to her touching his food, and she accuses him of being obsessive-compulsive. Let’s face it. People like Howie Mandel look ridiculous. Therefore, if you do not want people to think you are anal, you are going to have to eat the food others have touched with good grace.
The consensus around the table on Morning Joe was that concern about touching other people’s food was irrational. People have been laying that charge against the rules of etiquette for centuries, and everyone has had seditious thoughts about table manners starting in childhood. But if you want to get along with people, you need to respect their whims and caprices, however irrational they may be. One element underlying food etiquette is the ick factor. Some things are icky, even though they make no sense. No matter how intimate I might be with a girlfriend, when she spends the night, she brings her own toothbrush. Never mind that we did some serious smooching the night before, when she gets up in the morning, she uses her own toothbrush for no better reason than that it would be icky for her to use mine.
Speaking of girlfriends, love has the power to override much of the ick factor, the toothbrush exception notwithstanding. It is sometimes said that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. It might be said, with equal justice, that the way to a man’s stomach is through his heart. When it comes to healthy eating, I almost qualify for sainthood, avoiding refined sugar, artificial sweeteners, trans fats, while eating organic as much as possible. But as so often happens to a man of strict virtue, a woman can come along and lead him into sin and depravity. No sooner do I succumb to her charms, than she is tempting me with fried chicken, buttered biscuits, and a chocolate cake she baked just for me.
Needless to say, she can touch my food all she likes, for the woman you love is always clean and pure. In fact, there is nothing I like more than to lie on the couch with my head in a woman’s lap, gazing up at her beautiful face, while she tenderly peels me a grape.