Zohran Mamdani's right, eating with hands is the best way to enjoy a biryani

Dubai: Listen up cutlery and culture crusaders, there’s only one correct way to eat that steaming plate of mutton biryani: with your hands. Not with a fork. Not with a butter knife. Because let’s be honest — nothing delicious ever truly tastes the same when it’s attacked with cold, clinical cutlery.

Eating with your hands is sensory experience. Fingers feel the heat, portion the rice, scoop the meat with semi-dry gravy just right. It’s cultural muscle memory. And it has no business being dragged into a political food fight.

But this week, Texas Republican congressman Brandon Gill decided to make an absolute controversial and distasteful meal out of a simple act: New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani eating biryani with his hands.

The now-viral video from 2023 shows Mamdani enjoying a meal the way millions across South Asia and Africa — with his fingers.

For this, Gill huffed online that Mamdani should “go back to the Third World” and accused him of refusing to adopt “Western customs.” Civilised people, he said, don’t eat like that.

Sir, all may be fair in politics and war, but why get this petty? If you’re threatened by a man eating rice and meat with his hands, you need thicker skin — and maybe some spice like cumin or turmeric in your life.

This isn’t about food. This is about culture, about race, and about using coded language to paint immigrants and people of colour as perpetually foreign.

It’s about punching down with a spoonful of supremacy. Because no one throws a tantrum when Americans bite into burgers, tacos, ribs, or pizza with their bare hands. But a brown man eating rice? Suddenly, it’s a diplomatic incident.

The irony? Gill is married to Danielle D’Souza, daughter of Indian-origin right-wing commentator Dinesh D’Souza — who has also been pictured eating with his hands. The internet, ever the equaliser, wasted no time digging those up. Someone even asked Gill if he eats Lays with a fork too. Honestly — fair question.

Danielle responded with a tweet insisting has always used a fork. Good for her. But culture isn’t a checklist.

Also, let’s be real — this isn’t about cutlery. It’s about control. About who gets to belong. And Gill’s remarks are just another tired attempt to gatekeep “civilisation” with stainless steel.

So eat your biryani with pride, Zohran. Wipe your fingers on your napkin and carry on. Because there’s nothing uncivilised about knowing exactly where biryani truly comes alive — right in our hands as we scoop the fragrant rice and that succulent meat.