Slurping noodles or soup can offend the sensibilities of westerners at the dinner table. On the other hand, slurping noodles is a polite way to demonstrate your appreciation of a dish for many Asians, who see the sounds as a way of complementing the chef.
“The idea there is that it shows that the noodles are so good that I can’t wait till they cool down,” says Josef Youssef, the founder and chef of Kitchen Theory, a design studio that curates chef’s tables, press launches and branded events.
Plus, many insist, slurping makes food taste better. While nobody is ever going to win the argument on what constitutes good table manners, science comes down on the slurpy side, revealing that it really does taste better.
