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Eating left handed (or not)

Anything Left-Handed Left handed life, Everyday & Practical
Left handed life Everyday & Practical

We had a comment from Rob today that made us think about this again...

"I was interested to read about how most left handers hold their knives and forks like a right hander would. I reckon that this possibly stems from how the table was laid out for us when we were children by our parents i.e. with the knife on the right and the fork on the left. I started off like this however I changed over around 25 years ago and have stuck to it (I couldn’t eat the other way now, it would feel so awkward!)

It’s interesting that most left handers, if just using a knife without a fork, for instance to cut bread, would have the knife in their left hand, yet swap it to their right hand if using a fork."

Our thoughts...

Our surveys show that the vast majority of lefthanders DO eat with the fork in their left and knife in their right (what is traditionally called "right-handed").   Yes, it is all a bit mixed up, but at least we do always use the same (left) hand to feed ourselves - either with a fork or a spoon, where right handers usually change hands, using a fork in their left when they have a knife as well but changing to use a spoon in their right when they are using it on its own.   Who is the more mixed up?   (mind you, it makes it easy for them to use a spoon and fork to eat spaghetti where we left handers git in a "right" muddle"!!)

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Comments 46

  1. Juste Moi
    I am right handed, but I use the fork in my left hand to eat. I use my spoon in my left hand to eat. I never thought about it until someone recently pointed it out to me.
  2. Catherine
    Then what am I gonna do? I eat with fork in my right and knife in my left hand because it's impossible for me to do in the 'right-handed way'.
  3. Sarah
    I am right handed and always have used the fork in my right hand and the knife in my left, does not feel correct the other way (you would be surprised at the amount of people who don't even notice). Also apparently when I knit we'll try to lol, I first knit a line as a right hander does then I swap hands (knitting needles) when doing another line. Also when I'm walking I don't swing my left arm only my right.
  4. Robert T
    What percentage of right handed people eat "left handed"? It it particularly uncommon?

    I personally am right handed, however I find it MUCH easier to cut with the left hand than the right when using both a knife and fork! Yet again I always keep the fork in the hand I write with at all times.

    Recently I have started feeling embarrassed when dining out seeing as all of my right-handed family eat with their forks in their left hand so I wanted to know what percentage of right handers (like myself) eat the "left handed" way?
    1. Bridget Wilson
      I’m right handed and eat with knife in left hand. Of course I was brought up by left handed people, but also remember school saying do opposite way which obvs has had no impact other than how to set table correctly. My daughter also does this as write handed person. All males in my family are left handed all women right handed. This now includes grandchildren… I work with elderly and reg cut up food for them which then I find confusing quickly trying to give back utensils in their correct hands lol… a lot of swapping hands I use carving knives with right hand. Cutting cooked food doesn’t require much effort so I think a lot of right handed people will prefer fork in right hand
  5. Angela Eccleston
    When I use a knife and fork, I eat "right handed" as it just seems easier (the rest of my family were right handed when I was a girl so I was bound to pick up some of their habits), although if I use a knife, fork or spoon seperately, I always use my left handed. I was lucky though because when my parents realised that I'm naturally left handed, they let me carry on being left handed. It's a pity that even now, some right handed people don't think like that.
  6. joel feila
    i eat with both my fork and knife in my left hand. when i cut something with a knife i hold the fork in my right hand and cut with my left then just switch back so my fork is in my left hand.
  7. Rachel S.
    I'm a natural lefty but I adapted to this righty world by learning to be ambidextrous. I basically switch whatever hand I'm eating with even without a knife. With a knife, I (most of the time) will pick the fork up in the right and the knife in my left, although I do notice myself sometimes doing vice versa for some weird reason. I generally eat with a spoon or fork in my left hand, but I also notice that I'll begin eating with my right hand on certain occasions without even thinking about it until later on. Then when I try to switch, for some reason it feels weird, even though I already use both hands to eat usually anyway. Also, if I'm just using a knife to spread something and no fork is involved, I always use my left hand. It feels weird in my right. If I'm trying to cut something, knife in one hand and fork in the other, if the angle I'm attempting to cut in feels awkward I just switch hands and that usually works perfectly fine for me. Sometimes when I do this I switch back, though.
    1. Rachel S.
      Also I can only use chopsticks in my left hand and even attempting to use my right ends up in a complete failure on my part. They just...collapse out of my hand. I think it's because when holding chopsticks I feel like I'm writing, and I write with my left hand.
  8. sue v
    I eat with my knife in my left hand and fork in my right.. unless i am only eating something that requires a fork and then it is in my left hand. I have 2 children who are both right handed and I have taught them to eat the way I do... and it actually works well for them because they are not tempted to switch cutlery to the other hands.. Being a brit now living in the US, I find that the americans have the worst table manners when it comes to cutlery.. they switch hands attack the meat with knife like barbarians and then switch back to eat... I dont understand why they waste so much time and energy..
    1. Catherine
      That's how I eat with fork and knife! And I wasn't the only one! Yeah!
  9. Kagiso
    I think we do it that way because for a left handed person holding the utensil that goes into your mouth feels more natural in your left hand. I know a lot of my friends who are right handed struggled to learn how to use the knife and fork because they naturally wanted to hold the fork in their right hand (I'm African so we often grow up eating with our hands or just spoons, we often learn the knife and fork story later on in life.).
    1. Liderien
      I am guilty of holding the knife in my left hand.
  10. John
    I use my left hand for the fork and spoon, right hand for the knife to cut items on the plate. However to spread things like mayo or peanut butter I use a knife in my left hand.
    1. LT
      I do the same thing ^^.
  11. Derick
    I sometimes wonder just how left-handed I really am. So far as eating is concerned, it's fork in left hand, knife in right. As long as I can remember (and I'm pushing 69 now) I've done it that way, and it feels natural. Preparing food is different. Cutting tends to be done left-handed, but for peeling things, potatoes and the like, the peeler or knife is usually in my right hand! Not sure why - as I said, it just feels natural. A friend, and my nephew's wife, both hold fork in right hand, knife in left. Even to me, a lefty, it looks awkward. Funny old thing, habit.
  12. Vishant
    When I was a kid, my left was dominant. As usual my teachers thought it was not right (pun intended). I was forced into write with my right hand. Now when I am all grown up, i met with a pretty terrible accident. Bad fortune or not, my right hand suffered a nerve injury because of which I have a right hand paralysis. Now i have to do everything with my left and it was in a very harsh way that i had to learn the exact meaning of irony. Though my right hand recovers yet it will take another 2 years to be at least half of what it used to be.
  13. Larry P
    Fork, spoon, chopsticks, and pencil go in the left hand and stay there. Knife goes in the right hand and stays there.
  14. Julie
    I use my left hand for the fork/spoon, and switch knife to left when needed. I have discovered that I evidently set the table for left handed also. At Thanksgiving my guests were questioning why the silverware was on the wrong side. Heh Heh!
    1. John
      It's only on the "wrong" side for them, Julie. To us Lefties, the silverware is on the RIGHT (correct ) side.
  15. AngelsHeart
    I always eat with my left hand of course. And I have to transfer the knife into my left hand to cut anything in my plate, then return it back to my right hand while returning the fork into my left. :)
  16. Elisabeth
    I started school in 1959 and my first teacher insisted I write with my 'wrong' hand, smacking me when I went to use my left hand. Luckily for me, my mother, also left-handed, was even more insistent that I be allowed to be left-handed, as I am almost totally left-dominant. I don't use my right hand for anything at all. I learned to eat with my fork in my left hand and knife in my right, but decided when I was about 10 that it would be much easier with my knife in my left hand and have eaten that way ever since. I use a spoon in my left hand, and if eating with just a fork, use my left. I also find it impossible to use fish knives, and have great pleasure in restaurants in asking for a left-handed one, knowing full well they won't have one! Funnily enough, my righty daughter uses her knife and fork left-handed, I suppose from copying me as a child. The office where I worked always knew when I had been using a computer as I had transferred the mouse to the left-hand side.
    1. gillian
      I don't like fish, so have not experienced the fish-knife problem. If you want to be really posh, the upper-class way of eating fish is with two forks!
  17. Dee
    I am a leftie. When I was in grade 5, my teacher spanked me for giving him a book using my left hand. I was hurt and cried coz i didn't understand then why. I used then to eat with my left hand but somehow along the way i stopped due to pressure from the right-handed world. This really made me feel very unconfortable coz i had to struggle while eating. Then one day I made up my mind to use my left hand again for good because after all this is my life and am really special because God made me a leftie. Today, am very proud of myself because I am one of the 10% lefties worldwide.
  18. Amber
    Fork always goes in the left and knife in the right! Theres one advantage we have over our right-handed earthmates! Go lefties!:)
  19. Emily
    Although I'm a proud lefty, I likke eating cutting food "righty". It makes eating so much easier! One of my righty friends commented on how after I cut steak I dont have to put down the knife and switch hands, and then I can go right on cutting. I love it! Righties inconvenience themselves so much when it comes to knives.
  20. koolperson99
    Long story short, i was adopted as a small child and found to have "terrible motor skills" all throughout grade school. I was put in OT and taught how to write, color, etc. (Not well, of course). Since it was likely I was trained to write righty ( which made my work God-awful all through grade school and high school), I started writing left-handed just recently and find it much less messy for me to eat/drink with my left as well. For as long as I could remember as a child, I always thought "fork always goes in the right hand". So that's what I did, and I was always told to stop using my left to cut my food! I would constantly spill my milk all over the table, get crumbs all over the floor, and make a complete mess of myself. Only time I'll go back to the "righty" way of eating is i absolutely HAVE to... like in an extremely crowded restaurant booth or something like that. Just now, I;m seeing the natural left-hander in me come out... :D
  21. Ken Johnson
    I eat with the knife in my left hand and the fork in the right, although even so I regularly drop bits of food onto the table or the floor. I'm all right with knives, forks and spoons. Gateau forks often have an edge on the wrong side but I use gateau forks that don't have an edge. Fish knives are impossible. I simply can't use right handed fish knives at all. They spin between my left thumb and forefinger uncontrollably, or they wave from side to side like windscreen wipers if I hold them in the wrong hand. The only place I've ever encountered a symmetrical fish knife, which I was able to use, was aboard a restaurant car on a train from London to Newcastle. The knife was marked LNER, so even then it had been around for thirty years or so. Since then, I have never seen a symmetrical fish knife anywhere.
  22. jojoS
    I always eat with the knife on my left hand and the fork on my right. Oddly enough, when using only the spoon or fork, I use my right hand. When using spoon and fork, I eat right handed.
  23. Tera
    I use my left hand for a fork and right for a knife. Left for a spoon. But i find myself switching hands if i am siting with a person on my left because we bump elbows.
  24. Sheila W.
    I do use a fork and knife in the right-handed way, but keep the fork in my left hand. If I'm just using a knife by itself to cut things (like peeling potatoes, etc.) I'll use my left hand. I also use chopsticks with my left hand, too. I do pretty much everything left handed, lol! Using right-handed scissors with my left hand is something I've done since I was a child and I don't know if I'd even want a left-handed pair.

    Btw, I'm the only lefty in my immediate family. All of my siblings and both of my parents are right-handed.
  25. Silvia
    When using fork and knife I'm in great trouble. I cut a piece of meat holding the knife in my left hand and the fork in my right, then I put down the knife and switch hands :) to pick up the piece holding the fork in my left hand. I have never been able to use the knife with my right hand and never been forced to do that. However, they forced me to write with my "proper" hand, but the good thing is that now I can write with both my hands :)
  26. Angela
    i am a chinese so i hold my chopsticks on my left and my spoon on my right.
    if there's only fork and spoon, spoon would be on my right and fork would be on the left.

    and when i go western, i'd still hold the knife on my left and fork on my right.

    conclusion is.. the utensil that i would be using the most in that particular meal would be on my left.

    glad my parents werent particular about the hand i use on dining table.
  27. Kate
    I live in the U.S. and here, we generally eat holding just one utensil at a time, unless of course we are cutting something on our plate, in which case the dominant hand uses the knife. When I lived in France I quickly adopted the custom of holding my fork in my left (which I had always done) and knife in the right the whole meal. No more switching cutlery from one hand to the other. Voila!
  28. DaniF
    I do the traditional "right-handed" way of eating in terms of fork in my left hand, but what about if you wanna go oriental and use chop sticks? Which hand do you use? I eat sushi with chop sticks in my left hand.
  29. Helene
    My problem dates back over 60 yrs. Catholic school forced me to change from being a lefty to a righty. Some areas of my daily living, to this day, are affected. Here are a couple examples. When eating and I need to pick up a fork and knife at the same time, I get thoroughly confused as to which hand needs to grasp which utensil. I must "think" before executing the move or ultimately have to switch them to the proper hands!
    1. cheryl
      Oh I am one of those kids too.....I am 65 and first 3 grades in country school and then 4th grade to a catholic school.....they had those desks that only were 1/2 and it was the right side. I was hit when i used my left hand.
      during that year, I went from a confident and happy kid to a scared and shy kid....parents let me go to public school after that but damage was done. But I am left handed most of the time but I am a hairdresser and had to use right handed scissors. So I use right hand to cut with scissors and a razor with my left...I also have to use my left hand to make it to my mouth while eating.
      I am an artist also and I have a son who is lefty and he married a lefty and both of thier girls are lefties....the youngest is an amazing artist at 14...
      glad to have found this site....
  30. Wendy
    I eat the conventional RH knife and LH fork with both . But spoon only left, fork only left, and have no idea what to do with the fork when faced with "posh pudding" and fork and spoon.

    My right handed son always ate with the knife in his left hand and fork in the right and laid the table for everyone like that
    1. Robert T
      I am the same as your right handed son, however I always lay the table with the forks on the left and the knives on the right - even for myself. However before I eat I switch the cutlery!
  31. Ian
    I too eat the "right-handed" way when using a knife and fork. As a left hander this seems the correct way to eat. However, I do struggle a bit when eating a pudding with a fork and and spoon. It feels correct to have the fork in the left hand (as I would with a knife and fork), but I then have a spoon in my right hand, which is being used to bring food to my mouth, which just feels wrong!

    If I swap to have the spoon in my left and the fork in the right, it now doesn't feel correct having a fork in my right hand!

    I usually resort to just using the spoon in my left hand.

    Anyone else have this problem with puds!
  32. Angie
    I do indeed eat 'right-handed' but certainly don't get in a muddle when using a spoon and fork to eat spaghetti! Fork in left hand, spoon in right hand. :)
  33. HeatherH
    I think it's quite sensible really as when eating 'right-handed', the 'aiming' hand (the one with the fork!) is the left.
    1. gillian
      The only thing I was expected to do righthanded was use of cutlery. Luckily I did not have trouble. Fork left, knife right. One utensil only, left hand, and can vary with spoon and fork.

      My daughter and my brother-in-law who are both left-handed, were allowed to choose for themselves, and both use knives and forks the same way as me. In fact my brother-in-law was astounded when he learnt it is what right-handers do, saying it must be easier for them the other way!

      My daughter''s boyfriend, and another of her friends, who are both righthanded have been to our house for meals. I noticed that they both hold their fork in their right hand and knife in their right.
  34. MartiM
    No, I switch hands depending on the item being actively used. Ah well. We never formally set the table when I was little, & my parents were thoughtful enough to put my utensils on the left.

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