Assignment Seven - Discussion

[Prof. Ryan Granger]

Please post your class discussion for Assignment Seven below.

Make sure you answer the following questions:

1. What kind of foods aren't good to use a fork for?
2. Discuss what you think is the most useful utensil out there.

Feel free to add more though!

[Prof. Will Lestrange]

1. When I think of foods that do not work well with forks, my immediate thought is those types of foods that would crumble against the prongs of the fork. Potato chips are a prime example; in fact, when they were first created by the chef George Crum (as a form of extra-thin fried potatoes), they were designed to crumble under tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt's fork! When Vanderbilt discovered that he could instead pick the resulting chips up with his hands and, more importantly, that they were delicious, Crum realized that his new dish had real potential as a finger food.

Other types of foods that do not work well with forks are foods that are primarily liquid in nature and therefore do not work well with the prongs of a fork. I immediately think of soups (though to be fair, there are soups which have dumplings or similar things which can be eaten with forks) and ice creams, whose liquid essence fits better on a spoon than on a fork!

2. Although most conventional utensils, like forks, knives, and spoons, are all useful in conveniently eating food without too much of a mess, these utensils are generally strictly optional. Most food which is traditionally eaten with a fork can be eaten without utensils; the result will just end up being messy. By contrast, most liquids cannot be readily consumed without help from a cup or similar device. When you want to drink water from a tap or a lake, for example, you will almost always start by taking a cup or glass, filling it with the water, and then drinking the water from that vessel (to be fair, a bottle can also take the place of the vessel). Without this help, it becomes much harder to handle the liquid than it would be to eat most solid food without utensils! Therefore, I will count the cup as the most useful utensil out there.

[Rory Devaney]

1. Forks are an awesome utensil for a lot of different types of foods, but there are foods that forks are just not able to be used for. Some of the types of foods that forks just do not work well for are soups, broths, water and jelly beans. Foods that a fork would partially work for are jello, jelly, pudding, stews and applesauce, depending on the consistency of the food.

2. I truly believe that the most useful utensil that is in use today would have to be the spork. How can you possibly go wrong with an utensil that has a spoon and a fork melded together in one package? A spork can be used to eat a soup and eat macaroni and cheese at the same time, without having to waste precious seconds from having to put down a spoon and pick up a fork.