Dining Guide / When Things Go Wrong

Bones and Things You Can’t Eat

If you find a small bone or pit in your mouth, cover your mouth with one hand, remove it with your fork or fingertips and set it on the edge of the plate.

Key Points

1. If something inedible ends up in your mouth, lightly cover your mouth with one hand and, as a rule, ease it onto the same fork you used to eat.
2. Set what you remove on the edge of your plate.
3. Fish bones are hard to catch on a fork, so taking them out with your fingertips while shielding your mouth is perfectly proper.
4. Gather bones, skin and other things you won’t eat at the far side of the plate to keep it tidy.

Do

• Shield your mouth with one hand
• Gather what you remove on the edge of the plate

Avoid

• Spitting it into your napkin
• Spitting it straight onto the plate
• Leaving it on the tablecloth

Handy Tip

Remember: “out the way it went in.” If it went in on a fork, it comes out onto the fork; if on a spoon, onto the spoon. Fish bones are the classic exception — fingers are fine.

Practice in a Lesson

• Fish and Meat — 6 min · Sign in to unlock

Sources

• Emily Post Institute, “Top Questions for Dining Out” — Finished-position signals, dropped utensils, inedible items and spills.
• Debrett's, “Essential Table Manners” — Posture, shared dishes, inedible items and discreet refusals.

Last updated: September 28, 2026