He’s the world’s fastest eater and, surprisingly enough, he’s not your brother-in-law. According to Nature Magazine, the star-nosed mole "can detect, identify and gulp down its small prey (usually insect larvae or earthworms) in an average of 227 milliseconds, less than a quarter of a second." This may all sound familiar to any cook who has ever prepared a holiday dinner, only to see it disappear in the blink of an eye. However, this world champion eater prefers to burrow in marshlands rather than socialize with humans.If you’re wondering how long a quarter of a second is, consider this comparison. USA Today reports that it takes 650 milliseconds for a car driver to brake after seeing a traffic light turn red. With reference to the ravenously hungry, star-nosed mole, 227 milliseconds is slightly less time than pop singer Britney Spears was married for the first time to her former high school sweetheart. In all fairness, the star-faced mole might eat fast simply out of frustration and loneliness. It can’t be easy to burrow most of the day and have a face that looks like it exploded. (The photo of the mole was unlike anything ever shown by on-line dating services.) On second thought, the mole’s face strongly resembles a popular taste treat, a deep-fried onion blossom.Because of our own heating habits, it’s easy to believe the story about the mole with the 22 little food-grabbing appendages ringing its nose. Reuters recently revealed that working parents aged 25 to 54 have only three hours a day to shop, do personal grooming and eat. That doesn’t leave a lot of time to chew and swallow.Americans spend so little time carefully chewing food or being seen doing it, that you might think "masticate" is a bad word. Fifty-dollar-a-plate wedding dinners and family holiday dinners, which have taken hours if not days to prepare, are gulped down faster than proverbial speeding bullets. "What a great-looking dinner!" and "My, that was good!" are often uttered in the same breath.The following guidelines might suggest if we’re eating too fast for our own good:Within a few seconds of finishing a meal, we can’t recall a single thing we’ve eaten. After scarfing down a meal that appeared to feature some sort of undercooked bird, we find out that the family’s pet canary is inexplicably missing from its cage. When the last dinner guest is taking his seat at the table, we’re already finishing off our desserts. Finally, although we have been told that chewing each mouthful of food 32 times is important for adequate digestion, we consider chewing to be an overrated waste of time. Instead of chewing, we shovel and gulp. Nature Magazine also noted that the star-nosed mole’s feeding pace "is so fast that they frequently make mistakes, skipping over edible food but later returning." Most of us can relate to that particular eating habit. In our world, it’s thought of as a meal do-over. The food items we overlook during the first feeding frenzy are stored in the refrigerator until the next mealtime. And we don’t refer to them as mistakes — they’re called leftovers.