Patrick Rothfuss Quotes

I was expected to sit at the table, learn how to eat properly.

On the Continent people have good food; in England people have good table manners.

I don't like people's table manners. That really puts you off eating food.

I remember so clearly from when I was five years old, my mom and dad arguing over - not over whether it was better, but whether it was proper or whether it was correct to eat with a fork or to eat with your hands, like we do in Sri Lanka. Proper. Like, what is the correct way to eat?

At the dinner table, if you can't think of anything to say, sit quietly. Don't throw rolls, or chew on your napkin.

Basil Stag Hare tut-tutted severely as he remarked to Ambrose Spike, 'Tch, tch. Dreadful table manners. Just look at those three wallahs, kicking up a hullaballoo like that! Eating's a serious business.

Be careful not to be the first to put your hands in the dish. What you cannot hold in your hands you must put on your plate. Also it is a great breach of etiquette when your fingers are dirty and greasy, to bring them to your mouth in order to lick them, or to clean them on your jacket. It would be more decent to use the tablecloth.

In proceeding to the dining-room, the gentleman gives one arm to the lady he escorts--it is unusual to offer both.

Elbows are never put on the table while one is eating.

Wearing a baseball cap or sleeveless shirt in a white-tablecloth restaurant is rude and makes other diners upset, just like someone on a cellphone.

Sitting down to a meal with an Indian family is different from sitting down to a meal with a British family.

Know how to behave at a fine restaurant, which is a telltale measure of social maturity.

Good manners: The noise you don't make when you're eating soup.

The old injunction 'Don't talk with your mouth full' is based on the presumption that, however multifunctional a mouth may be, it should only perform one job at a time. Humans have found a way around this limitation in the form of food writing.

Jeans should never be worn to someone's home if you are having dinner there.

Smacking or chewing really loud and obnoxiously at dinner is a no-no. You know, if we're eating tacos, and I know we gotta use our hands, but if it gets all over your face, it's not sexy to me. That's not a good look.

Civilization has taught us to eat with a fork, but even now if nobody is around we use our fingers.

And I find chopsticks frankly distressing. Am I alone in thinking it odd that a people ingenious enough to invent paper, gunpowder, kites and any number of other useful objects, and who have a noble history extending back 3,000 years haven't yet worked out that a pair of knitting needles is no way to capture food?

Do not speak of repulsive matters at table.

Never lick a steak knife.

Never laughing too loudly in a restaurant no matter how good the joke.

There are two good reasons to put your napkin in your lap. One is that food might spill in your lap, and it is better to stain the napkin than your clothing. The other is that it can serve as a perfect hiding place. Practically nobody is nosey enough to take the napkin off a lap to see what is hidden there.

Avoid banquets which are given by strangers an ignorant persons. But if there is ever occasion to join them, let your attention be carefully fixed, that you slip not into the manner of the vulgar (the uninstructed).

Civilised adults do not take apple juice with dinner.

EAT, v.i. To perform successively (and successfully) the functions of mastication, humectation, and deglutition. 'I was in the drawing-room, enjoying my dinner,' said Brillat-Savarin, beginning an anecdote. 'What!' interrupted Rochebriant; 'eating dinner in a drawing-room?' 'I must beg you to observe, monsieur,' explained the great gastronome, 'that I did not say I was eating my dinner, but enjoying it. I had dined an hour before.'