Finger Food
Since our arrival six weeks ago, we’ve been enjoying meals prepared by our landlord’s wife. (We don’t quite have our kitchen set up yet, and even if we did, we’re too busy with language lessons to do much shopping or cooking.) Lunches and dinners are generally rice with dal (lentil or bean sauce) and cooked vegetables. We’re grateful that she has diminished the quantity of chili she uses, in order to accommodate our wimpy palates!
Our landlord explained to us early on that they normally eat with their right hands, but that they would provide spoons for us. For the first month or so we used the spoons, but then decided to make the switch to “manual” eating. Eating with our hands is certainly not a new experience for us, as this was normal where we used to live, in West Africa. But we didn’t want to assume that the same technique was used here, so we got some coaching from our landlord’s family. 
We’ve been practicing at each meal, scooping food up with our fingers together, and slurping it into our mouths, with less and less mess. Another important question: At the end of the meal, am I being impolite if I lick my fingers? Answer: No, in fact, licking off my fingers will signal that I really appreciated the meal!
Our landlord’s wife beamed with delight the first time we told her we didn’t need spoons. They say here that food tastes better when eaten with the hands, so she probably thought we hadn’t truly been appreciating her food! Now we get the full sensory experience! Afterwards, despite licking my fingers and then washing my hands with soap, I noticed that my fingernails retained the turmeric-yellow color of the dal. After lunch yesterday we were walking on the main street of our “village” and met our friend Shahaz’s husband in front of his shop. He greeted us warmly and reached out his hand to shake Brad’s. I noticed that his fingers were also yellow, and I laughed and showed him mine. He smiled and said, “It looks like we both had a good lunch!” Dal-stained fingernails… one small way of getting closer to our food, and to the people and culture it represents.
Posted in Uncategorized and tagged Manual Eating by Lisa