History of Utensils: a marvelous website to learn

[Gifted Gourmet]

When people sit down to eat a meal, they seldom give much thought to the "tools" or tableware before them. The history of tableware, however, is an interesting one. Changes in eating habits, social trends, and the blending of cultures have all resulted in changes in both form and function of cutlery and in its social implications.

So, with that thought in mind, take a look at what I believe is a fantastic website on tableware and the types of things people have been eating with for many years:

The history of eating utensils

Sections cover the history of many different topics:

Forks, Chopsticks, Knives, Portable cutlery, and Spoons

Do you still have tableware from the history of your family that dates back in time?

Any special pieces your family has given to you?

Treasure and use only on special occasions?

[chromedome]

Nothing to contribute as far as utensils...but man! what a cool site. Gonna lose an evening there, sometime real soon...

[Gifted Gourmet]

but man! what a cool site

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Which is precisely why I thought it would be understood and appreciated here at eGullet! Sometimes, there is something which requires no discussion and simply more reading for pleasure .. which is the case here, obviously!

[StudentChefEclipse]

I love Love LOVE this site! Thanks so much!

As far as utensils, I still have the first set of chopsticks my dad brought back from Okinawa when I was a small child. It seems to me that he brought all of us kids back a set, and told us he thought it would be good to learn to use them. Though, since I am the only one who can this might be a faulty memory. I like it anyway.

[Gifted Gourmet]

I love Love LOVE this site! Thanks so much!    As far as utensils, I still have the first set of chopsticks my dad brought back from Okinawa when I was a small child.

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I liked the section of this website on chopsticks as well, StudentChefEclipse!

In Japan, chopsticks were originally considered precious and were used exclusively for religious ceremonies. The earliest chopsticks used for eating looked like tweezers; they were made from one piece of bamboo that was joined at the top. By the 10th Century, chopsticks were being produced in two separate pieces.

Live and learn!

[Jensen]

Very cool site indeed!

One of the things that makes it even cooler is that, if you go poking around a little bit, you discover that they also have a section entitled In the Victorian Kitchen --

This exhibit will take you back to the Victorian Period to learn about tableware and kitchen tools. Discover how the 19th Century Industrial Revolution changed the ways people prepared, served, and ate food. These changes were only possible with the invention of many new labor-saving kitchen utensils.

And (as if that wasn't enough), there is another section on the teapot (tetsubin) used in Japanese tea ceremonies (click here for tetsubin).

How cool is that?

[andiesenji]

Another great topic Melissa!! Right down my alley as I consider eating utensils much the same as gadgets and collect the same.

I do tend to drive my friends up the wall, when watching a period film, where something appears that is an anachronism.

Perhaps it isn't all that important but I think that the people who do the research for a film setting should know when some implement or utensil doesn't belong, particulary when a bit of "business" peformed by the actor involves the item.

Studying how utensils developed is so interesting, and in particular, with the Victorians, who had a particular utensil for every purpose imagniable. Growing up in a household dominated by real Victorians, I saw this first hand. My great grandmother would no more sit down at the dining table without her fish slice in her array of flatware, than she would come downstairs without her corset.

Quite a bit of my silver was inherited, including some pieces that had already been passed down several genrations before I got them. I have several pieces of Bateman silver, 2 by Hester, 1 by Peter and 4 later pieces by Peter, Ann and William. My family often mixed and matched silver services when there were a large number of people for meals. They didn't think of putting the "good stuff" away and only taking it out for special occasions. It was used every day and there was of course some rotation of the various services. I learned early on that silver tarnishes more readily if it is not used and washed and handled every day.

[andiesenji]

Some utensils have become obsolete during my lifetime.

This picture of a place setting of my grandmother's sterling includes an individual butter knife.

The service butter knife is shown along with the sugar shell in the upper right. I use this all the time and the only time it ever gets polished is when it has been near eggs.

The individual butter knives were phased out during the 40s. In some of the older sets there are several more pieces in each place setting. I have those in a safe deposit box because at the moment I don't have an adequate safe or one that is large enough to hold all the things I don't want to lose.

[fou de Bassan]

I love this topic! I have my great-grandmother's chicken frying fork and her cutting board. They are the tools I saw her use almost daily. We also have some olivewood eggcups from my husband's grandmother but that's as far back as it goes.

This site really brings out my inner archivist(and I don't let her out that often).

[Gifted Gourmet]

A Tool for Every Treat

visitors will gaze upon Renaissance-era utensils whose carved ivory handles are tiny religious masterpieces, Napoleon's traveling silverware, and modern upstart utensils like the spork and its relatives. But passionate defenders of this declining art form see the show as a chance to revive the stature it once had at the table. "These are the tools that turned eating into dining" said Sarah Coffin, a curator at the museum who has been researching the subject for almost 30 years. Western utensils are relative latecomers: while the Romans were sticking shells onto sticks to make early spoons, the Chinese had already refined the use of chopsticks over thousands of years.  In the West, knives were the first tool to come to the table, as personal weapons that were also used for cutting and spearing meat. In the 1600's, the pointed tip ...

"tools that turned eating into dining"? A very cool article on this subject! Not true for people who enjoy eating in their cars ...

Symposium for the Cooper-Hewitt exhibition

I would just love to hear some of the presenters ...

[andiesenji]

This is the kind of exhibition I love. Such as the teapot exhibition I attended a few years ago at the Bowers Museum and Bowers Kidseum in Santa Ana. (Orange County museums run the gamut from the Nixon library to the International Surfing Museums - I think the Bowers is the best.)

When I was stationed at the Presidio, San Francisco back in the late 50s, Gumps had a wonderful display of Victorian silver during Christmas. It was fantastic.