A while back, we posted a blog asking our readers this question: “How do you eat a banana?” Greta and I had a “heated” discussion about this topic one day when she observed me eating my banana like a monkey. (For all you monkey-wannabes out there, you simply peel it and eat it while still holding onto the peel, as if the peel were a wrapper. Sort of like eating a chocolate bar.) Greta reacted as if this was some form of neanderthal behaviour on my part, and insisted that the only way to eat a banana is to peel the whole thing, then carefully remove the banana, break it into pieces and eat it daintily. I informed her that eating in in this way means you get your hands quite slimy and gucky, and besides, the peel is laden with pesticides which you then get all over your slimy banana.
Thankfully, when we posted our blog asking for your opinions, my monkey business was the unanimous, if not runaway, winner. Neanderthals of the world, unite!
So the other day, when I was playing golf with my friend Sue (who I know is a monkey-eater also and that’s why we’re friends), she suggested I pose this question to the universe: How do you eat your corn on the cob? Do you (a) go round and round and round the cob; or (b) Do you make like a typewriter, going along the length of the cob and then starting over? What, exactly, is the proper etiquette? I know which one I do, but I won’t reveal my method in case I’m breaking some sacred Martha Stewart/Greta Podleski School of Eating Etiquette rule.
Can you help me out here? How do you nibble on your niblets?
12 responses so far ↓
1 Diane // Aug 10, 2006 at 12:12 pm
Very carefully shaving it with a fork so it doesn’t get stuck in your teeth.
2 Greta Podleski // Aug 10, 2006 at 1:01 pm
Diane, I don’t get what you mean? You actually use a fork to eat corn on the cob? Well, I’ll be danged! (Or whatever that stupid expression is!) Me, I do a combo of both methods. Take approximately three big bites side by side, like a typewriter, then go back to the beginning, rotate my cob, and take three more big side-by-side bites. Like this: Bite, bite, bite, twirl. Bite, bite, bite, twirl, etc. When I’ve gone all the way around the cob, then I start over again in the middle of the cob, and when that section’s done, I proceed to the end of the cob. Not sure what Martha (or a psychiatrist) would say about this, but that’s my method and I’m stickin’ to it!
3 MIke // Aug 10, 2006 at 8:25 pm
I just posed the same question the other evening when I was at my neighbours for dinner….of the four of us……the 2 guys were round and round types and the ladies (Mother and daughter) were typewriter eaters….I wonder if this is a gender thing or a hereditary item like eye colour!!
4 Dianne Verzyl // Aug 11, 2006 at 12:02 pm
I love your books have all of them and use them all the time.
I would love to see a book or section in your next one on diabetes, I have diabetes 2 and always looking for something tastefull.
thank you for the great meals. . My daughter and her family also enjoy your recipes.
Dianne
5 Monique // Aug 11, 2006 at 1:29 pm
Well my technique may not transfer to type, but I will try…. first I munch out a swath or maybe 3 or 4 rows. After this begins my real corn-on-the-cob enjoyment. I eat the rows on the bottom the clear-cut using my lower teeth to “cut” the corn-nibs off the cob. I eat a single row at a time travelling from one end of the row to the next. I do not use my upper teeth, only the bottom ones. I find by eating with my bottom teeth and taking from the bottom of the corn-rows I avoid the never attractive “corn-in-the-teeth-smile”. I guess this makes me a bottom feeder when it comes to corn
6 Albert Fortin // Aug 12, 2006 at 4:57 am
I’m the typewriter type all the way, my sister cut the grains out with a sharp knife because of problems with her false teeth.I go to see your blogs every morning and enjoy them really.
Albert
7 Moe // Aug 13, 2006 at 9:18 pm
I eat it with a fork as well……. less messy and I like it hot so it doesn’t burn me if I use a fork.
8 Miriam // Aug 14, 2006 at 3:51 pm
I eat it with my fingers - sort of.
I pick off each kernel individually in a circle - not typrwriter fashion.
I do it this way, because I can’t stand getting anything stuck in my teeth, and this way, I really really get to savour the corn.
Only problem is, it can take me up to an hour to eat an ear of corn.
But man, it’s good!!!
9 Janet Podleski // Aug 14, 2006 at 10:40 pm
Dear Miriam,
Sounds like you should just buy a bag of Green Giant Niblets, although your complicated cob-navigating sounds like it could result in the so-called “negative calorie syndrome.” You know, like celery, where they say that the process of eating it burns off more calories than the actual calories contained in the food item. More power to ya!
10 Kyla // Aug 16, 2006 at 11:58 pm
This was really interesting to read. I want to buy your cook books just haven’t had the money to do so yet. Maybe my husband will buy me one for my birthday, in Oct.
I eat my corn any old way that I can…but maybe it is more like the typewriter style I guess. The point is to eat all the corn …it is fun eating….no particular way…just enjoying…angeldoll
11 Theresa Eveleigh // Aug 20, 2006 at 9:03 pm
To eat corn on the cob you need to make “handles”at both ends so I eat about an inch inwards all around the cob on both ends. Now I can hold the cob by the “handles” and proceed the typewriter way eating 3 row depths at a time from left to right of course. I love corn on the cob!
12 Norma // Aug 29, 2006 at 11:39 am
I cheat, I cut the corn off of the cob and eat it with a fork.
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