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The next time you eat something with your hands, take a moment to notice how it feels on your fingertips before taking a bite. If it’s a burger, are the buns smooth or covered in a smattering of sesame seeds? When you put pressure on them with your fingers, does the bread squish down or is it more of a crumby affair? Then, when you finally take a bite, notice how satisfying it is to sink your teeth through its layers; soft bun giving way to crunchy lettuce or onion, to oozy cheese to, finally, juicy patty. Now think about how different it would be if you had used a knife and fork. Eating with one’s hands is an immensely pleasurable experience. While in the West, the act is usually confined to foods encased in bread or pastry, Indian, African and some other Asian cultures are more adept at using their fingers for dishes that might seem too “messy” or “sticky” on this side of the world. One of my favourite dishes is banana leaf rice, which at its core comprises of rice, vegetables and curry. I mix each element of the dish and use a pinching motion with all five fingers to construct the perfect bite, before sweeping it up in a quick motion and delivering the food to my mouth. I find that it forces me to really consider each bite, from what flavours and textures I want it to contain, to how large a portion I can manage. Up until a few months ago, I never really thought about how often I eat with my hands. Like many people, I associated it closely with Indian meals and always thought that Western culture was too obsessed with polite society to really dig their fingers in. This is still true, to an extent – many South Asians who grew up eating with their hands report being looked at with horror when they attempted to do the same in public here. But, after witnessing my very white British husband happily dig into banana leaf rice when we began dating, and having conversations with friends about the topic, I’ve come to realise that eating with our hands is a much more universal act than I thought. For example, burgers, pizzas, hot dogs and chips are all eaten by hand – unless you’re eating one of those beastly burgers that tower too high and need to be deconstructed. Then there’s things like fried chicken or shellfish, which are simply easier to pick up, pull apart and pry open using your fingers. Foods like Mexican burritos and tacos or Japanese sushi are commonly picked up by hand and devoured. Some people enjoy eating salads by hand, finding it easier to use pieces of lettuce filled with dressing and other ingredients like edible spoons. A surprising proponent of this was Sylvia Plath, who wrote in the third chapter of her 1963 novel The Bell Jar that she observed a poet eating a salad “with his fingers, leaf by leaf”, making it “seem to be the only natural and sensible thing to do”. The more I think about it, the more I realise that my hands are my favourite utensil. No one is delicately picking up crisps with chopsticks or forking a French fry. All manner of flat breads – from parathas and naans to injeras – beg to be torn apart by hands and used to mop up dhal and curry. I would never think of eating a sandwich with a fork and knife, any more than I would for a Taiwanese bao. It just seems wrong. On this side of the world, cutlery has reigned supreme until very recently. Primitive humans have been carving knife and spoon-like implements for centuries, while the fork is a surprisingly modern invention. According to the Smithsonian Magazine, a Byzantine princess debuted a golden fork at her wedding feast in Venice 1006, which disgusted locals who ate using their fingers and knives. One Venetian apparently condemned such a tool and said: “God in his wisdom has provided man with natural forks – his fingers. Therefore it is an insult to him to substitute artificial metal forks for them when eating.” There’s perhaps also an aspect of self-consciousness being thrown out the window when we eat with our hands. It banishes the concept of formality and Anglocentric ‘table manners’ Surekha Ragavan Despite the initial rejection, forks became a mainstay across Europe after 1533 when Catherine De Medici, wife of Henry II, hauled a collection of silver forks from Italy to France in 1533. Three hundred years later, the full set of silverware as we know it had integrated itself into everyday life in Europe. Manners-obsessed Victorians then made up all sorts of etiquette rules, from how to hold a fork, to the myriad of different-sized cutleries with very specific purposes – like fish knives and dessert spoons. These became class markers, separating the upper echelons of society with their dinky utensils from the lower classes, who worked too much to care about which spoon went where. But one thing could be agreed upon – eating with one’s hands was considered impolite and vulgar in almost all culinary situations. That is, until about a decade ago when DeBrett’s, the British authority on etiquette and behaviour, declared in their 2012 guide that “table manners are no longer about adhering to a rigid, and outdated, code of conduct”. The experts named foods like pizza and calzone as “acceptable” foods to be eaten using your hands. It also advised such adventurous eaters to create “as little mess as possible”, sit up straight and ensure you “never put your elbows on the table”, proving that some old habits die hard. Bristol-based restaurateur Rashintha Rodrigo, one of the five founders of Sri Lankan restaurant group The Coconut Tree, says he eats almost anything with his hands – even a roast dinner. “I start with a fork and knife but always find myself picking pieces of chicken or potato off my plate with my fingers towards the end of the meal,” he laughs. He also grew up eating rice and curry with his hands in Sri Lanka, and felt self-conscious about doing the same when he moved to Britain. But these days, he finds it liberating. “It’s become more accepted in the past five or six years and more people are curious about it,” Rodrigo says. Surekha Ragavan, founder of Periuk, a digital archive of heritage Malaysian recipes, also finds freedom in the act. “There’s perhaps also an aspect of self-consciousness being thrown out the window when we eat with our hands. It banishes the concept of formality and Anglocentric ‘table manners’,” she says, reminding me of another observation by Plath in The Bell Jar. The author’s liberation is slightly different, though, as she wrote: “I’d discovered, after a lot of extreme apprehension about what spoons to use, that if you do something incorrect at a table with a certain arrogance… nobody will think you are bad-mannered or poorly brought up. They will think you are original and very witty.” Those who advocate eating with hands often also say it makes the food taste better, but no one seems to be able to pinpoint why. Jose Pizzaro, the acclaimed Spanish owner and founder of the Pizarro group of restaurants, describes it as “the best way to eat”. “It’s a visceral pleasure that’s really hard to beat,” he says. “It creates a sort of magical connection between you and the food. If you’ve never eaten a big, fat, juicy prawn covered with garlic and lemon with your hands, and then go through the ritual of pulling off the legs and the shell and then sucking the brains out – you haven’t lived!” But why is the tactile sensation of touching food so delightful? Some opine that touching your food is beneficial because you can gauge food temperature better with your fingers, and so run a lower risk of burning your tongue. Others claim that your fingers have “healthy bacteria” on them that get transferred into your digestive system when you eat with your hands, but these are difficult to quantify. However, Charles Spence, professor of experimental psychology at the University of Oxford, believes the pleasure lies in our perception of food, as opposed to any other physical benefits. In his review of how the experience of eating changes when people eat with their hands instead of cutlery, Spence found that having more direct, tactile contact with food appears to “enhance the experience” of eating and drinking. “There’s a lot of sensory input that happens even before we put the food in our mouth,” he says. “Just by using our sensitive finger pads, we almost anticipate how tasty something is going to be before it reaches our tongue.” There’s practicality in using our hands to eat, too. We can determine how ripe a fruit is by squeezing it gently, or figure out if something is going to be soft or crunchy before biting into it. Of course, there are some dishes that are simply not hand-friendly. Noodles, pasta and soups obviously require cutlery to eat, but there’s nothing to stop us from taking more joy in the foods we can eat with our hands. If you’ve never tried handling anything beyond a sandwich or a pasty, I fully encourage you to try something new. Take a leaf out of Plath’s book with your next salad, perhaps, or take the plunge into some rice and curry. It will require practice to develop the skill of eating without dropping rice absolutely everywhere, but I promise you, it’s worth it. Read More Adorable, cuddly… evil? How the Furby took over the world ‘You think it’s going to be a money making machine’: How modern life killed the hobby The dish that defines me: Mallini Kannan’s baked honey-soy salmon 30-minute summer recipes for all the family to enjoy What to cook this week: Tomato tart, sweetcorn pasta and other summery suppers The dish that defines me: Mallini Kannan’s baked honey-soy salmon

If TikTok has taught us anything, it’s that Gen Z as a group hold a lot of opinions, especially when it comes to Millennials. A viral video recently proved this point as a millennial person was called “PR nightmare” by their Gen Z friend for the way they wear sunglasses. In the clip, a group of friends appeared to be sunbathing. The millennial who was filming it informed viewers that her friend had made fun of her friend for the way she wore her sunglasses. The woman joked that she had been on the receiving of “bullying” all day and was called a “PR nightmare” by her younger friend. She proceeded to show people how she wears them, by placing them on her face in a normal-looking way. But, her Gen Z friend next to her laughed and said “it’s so shoved into your face”. She continued, saying she looks like “a dad that wears a visor”. The Gen Z-er explained the “normal” way is to have them “mid-nose”. The clip ended with asking viewers which way they wear them, sparking a debate in the comments. @jordanharpernp tough to keep uo with the trends these days ? #millennialsoftiktok #millenialvsgenz #millennial “The dad way… I’m trying to stop the wrinkles from appearing,” one user commented. Another simply wrote: “I am learning that Gen-Z thinks a lot and I do not care enough to think about these things.” Someone else said: “I mean I wear them in such a way that they block the sun from my eyes.” One person added: “I didn’t know there was a wrong way to wear sunglasses. I just put them on.” The Gen Z vs. Millennial debate appears to show no sign of stopping. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

If you’re lucky enough to have secured tickets for Glastonbury 2023, you’ll soon be packing up your camping gear, sunnies and snacks ready for five days of musical magic. Wondering what to wear this year? While your wardrobe will be somewhat dictated by the weather, all being well you’ll be able to bust out some fabulous summer outfits for dancing the days and nights away. We asked style experts for their predictions on the festival fashion trends that will be taking over Worthy Farm this year… Crochet “Crochet is a must-have festival fashion trend this year for so many reasons,” says Talia Johnson, senior creative manager at PrettyLittleThing, who thinks bolder is better when it comes to the boho look. “Opt for a versatile crochet co-ord set in a vibrant colour of your choice,” she suggests. “If the Somerset weather isn’t up to par, a crochet set can easily be matched with a faux fur coat for a really breezy day or a cropped denim jacket for a ‘just in case’ scenario.” Celebrity stylist and presenter Kay Wyer is loving the retro 70s glam look. “This trend is all about crochet anything and everything, like cut-out tops and wide-leg trousers teamed with embellished belts,” she says. “If boho chic isn’t your thing, you can add a fringed jacket or shorts to a simpler, minimal outfit or accessorise your look with a crochet hat.” Matalan Pink Swing Crochet Lace Vest Top, £19 FatFace Crochet Phone Bag, £25 Cowgirl cool PrettyLittleThing Shape Indigo Denim Raw Hem Edge Cropped Jacket, £23 (was £25); Shape Indigo Denim Low Rise Micro Mini Skirt, £20 (was £22), boots, stylist’s ownThe cowgirl trend is still going strong, and this summer there are two ways to wear it. “The coastal cowgirl trend is a Western-inspired style that has taken over social media this year and is simple to embrace into your festival style,” says Johnson, who recommends double denim outfits to “perfectly combat unpredictable UK weather”. And, of course, cowboy boots: “There are so many different styles when it comes to cowboy boots, whether it’s a suede material, a fringed hem or a stitch detail, the choice is yours and you’ll certainly stand out in the crowd.” The other, more colourful, cowgirl look is ‘Western Barbie’. “Unlike your usual cowgirl outfit with muted tones and washed-out denim shorts, this trend is bold and vibrant,” Wyer says. “It’s all about layering up an all-pink outfit, adorned with embellishment or metallics and paired with some eye-catching cowboy boots. Be sure to have at least one statement piece – you can’t go too far with this look.” Oliver Bonas Glam Metallic Cowboy Hat, £29.50 Goldsmith Vintage Striped Pattern Shorts, £32.95 Suit up A jazzy jumpsuit or printed playsuit is your shortcut to festival cool. “From dazzling sequins to shimmery mesh, to bell sleeves and an extreme halter neck, all-in-ones are practical yet glamorous fashion statements that you can quickly throw on and go,” says Johnson. “For even more bust support while dancing the day away, feel free to wear a brightly coloured bikini underneath to highlight the raver vibe.” Very X Lucy Mecklenburgh Long Sleeve Bardot Beach Playsuit, £25 Mesh moment A trend that started on the catwalks last year, mesh and macrame fabrics are big news this summer. “Mesh can be playful and edgy or sheer and sexy, depending on how much you want to cover,” says Wyer. “You can opt for a beachy open-knit dress or a flowy sheer ensemble, worn over a silk slip dress or a bikini and shorts. Team with a pair of statement sunglasses and some chunky boots and you’re good to go.” River Island Orange Mesh Long Sleeve Top, £26 Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live 11 ways to work white into your interiors Archewell donates £10,000 to get diverse book in all secondary schools How to react kindly to people with Tourette’s – and what not to say