Etiquette for Eating Green Corn

“… when folks, even the most refined folks - folks that won’t even permit a poodle to sleep with them - start in on their boiled corn part of the menu, past precedent is thrown to the winds. The book of rules is consigned, with all other etiquette, to a warmer place, and every man is content to get his corn off the cob in the fastest and most convenient way in which he is able to operate.” –Even with the plethora of tools and forks for eating corn from the cob, and the seemingly endless 19th century creativity of design elements in making those tools and forks, inventors and designers never quite came up with a solution for making the task of eating corn from the cob appear “civilized.”  Above is a selection of patented tools, including strippers or scrapers, forks and holders, designed for eating corn on the cob.

GREEN CORN – HOW TO EAT IT!

The world is able to classify a man by two things his table manners and the style of his hand baggage. For instance, if, in your travels, you encounter an individual at a hotel who can cover his knife with mashed potatoes to the hilt and then get them all off without injury to his tonsils, you immediately have this man’s social number. On the other hand, if he carries a canvas telescope or “knee knocker” reinforced by a part of his wife’s clothes line, then you are also able to classify him properly.

You may have an inkling of a man's “bringing up” by the tools he chooses in eating his pie, or by the manner in which he muffles his exhaust in eating soup. Yet when it comes to green corn, every known rule is violated.

Some ways for eating certain things are planned for economical reasons. Thus the country hotel keeper serves his olives in a bottle and expects you to get them out with your fingers. He also furnishes you with possibly a grapefruit or orange in the morning and expects you to keep your ears clean with a paper napkin. There are recognized ways of taking soup into the system and these ways all call for a limit to the noise zone.

But when folks, even the most refined folks - folks that won’t even permit a poodle to sleep with them - start in on their boiled corn part of the menu, past precedent is thrown to the winds. The book of rules is consigned, with all other etiquette, to a warmer place, and every man is content to get his corn off the cob in the fastest and most convenient way in which he is able to operate.

No, neighbor, we shall never have to worry about any styles relative to denuding the cob of its succulent kernels. We may have worried whether it is proper to remove jelly from the nose with a fork or a napkin, and it may have annoyed us to remember whether it is better form to sneeze under or over the table, but we shall never have to tax our brain on new rules for eating green corn from the cob. It is a catch-as-catch-can proposition and the farm hand is just as refined and just as mannerly at this delectable pursuit as the guy who learned his table manners from a young woman’s seminary. – Imperial Valley Press, 1915

🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber of The RSVP Institute of Etiquette, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Etiquette Humor for Corn Eaters

“Fork never made to eat corn on the cob”?!? Au contraire! Victorian “Green Corn” was a popular food to serve in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. Over a sixty to seventy year period, numerous green-corn forks were invented and patented for eating ears of corn on the cob. – The corn fork shown above was made in the 1920’s, as was the patented dish with cover for serving corn on the cob.

Fork Never Made to Eat Corn on the Cob…

May Be Breach of Table Etiquette, But the Fellow Who Attacks the Ear With Two Hands is the One Who Gets the Thrills

There isn't much joy in eating corn on the cob with a fork, is there? I'll say there isn't. At least not for the fellow who likes to get all the thrills that go with hold ing a big, juicy ear in both your mitts. This may not be according to Hoyle, and may be a violation of the rules of table etiquette.

But the fellow who is guided by the old rule that “fingers were made before knives and forks and other eatin’ utensils” and attacks the said big, juicy ear in a way that would make John D. Rockenfeller green with envy, is the guy who gets the thrills and all the trimmings thrown in.

Saw a person a few days ago in a crowded eating place trying to pry corn off a cob with a fork. That may be good, straight-laced table etiquette, but to me that fork seemed about as much in place as the Kaiser in Paris.

Really, I felt sorry for the person, for nearby were others who were getting every bit of the kernels clear down to the place where they were fastened onto the cob. One fellow made the remark that it was so good that he felt like taking it back and asking the waiter to put more corn on his cob.

The only way to eat an ear of corn is to butter it well, with a sprinkling of salt and pepper and then make a “head-on” attack. The fellow who has insecure teeth at a time of this kind is out of luck. The man who eats his corn this way is never happier than when he has finished the job and is licking his mouth with his tongue, unless it is when he is in the middle of the operation.

The same rule applies to watermelons. There is no pleasure using a fork, the real pleasure is running your mouth into the red, juicy fruit, getting every drop of the sweet flavored thing. Yum! Yum!– By Al Falfa of Riverside Daily Press, 1920

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia