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what the fuuck
Thats "American style", while keeping the fork in the non-dominant hand is "European style". Allegedly, it dates back to when meals were served "service à la française", which is when all courses are brought out at once, which is obviously the more common method of home cooking. Restaurants started doing "service à la Russe", which is where courses are brought out one at a time.
With service russe, you have new sets of silverware with each course (or they are arranged in order), so if you are eating a course that doesn't need a knife, you won't be given one, and you'll have your fork in your dominant hand. If you need a knife, that goes in your dominant hand, and you leave it there for the duration of the course.
With service française (or regular home cooking), you just have one set of silverware, and you only use the knife when you need it, so you might switch your fork to your dominant hand when you are done needing the knife.
For example, in America, no one eats a steak switching hands for every bite (cause that would be dumb and inefficient), and in Europe, you probably wouldn't eat a meal that doesn't need a knife with a knife in your dominant hand (cause that would also be dumb and inefficient).
I wonder are there cultures where you hold the knife in your non-dominant hand because switching the fork around always seemed inefficient.
This whole conversation is weird to me. Fork in my dominant hand and knife in the other. Never seen anyone put their knife down or switch grips.
the fork should always be on the left, and the knife on the right, no matter your handedness.
(According to certain styles of manners, which are of course entirely arbitrary and subjective)
yeah but i grew up with them so they're objectively correct
That's the spirit!
I was discouraged from doing that as a kid so ended up just cutting everything beforehand and then switching hands because it was faster.
knife is always on the right, not the dominant hand. it's to make sure you don't bump into your neighbor by both doing the same movement at the same time.
Yeah, this is not typical.