What is Hand and Foot?
Hand and Foot is a canasta game in which every player is dealt two sets of thirteen cards: a hand to play first, and a foot that waits face down until the hand is used up. Once you have melded or discarded the last card of your hand, you pick up your foot and play on from it. The game uses one more pack than there are players, each with two jokers, and everyone draws two cards a turn.
Melds are books of one rank that close once they reach seven cards: a clean book has no wild cards, a dirty book has some. Threes are never melded. The minimum first meld depends not on the score but on the hand being played, rising from 50 to 90, 120 and 150, and the game lasts exactly four hands; the highest total wins. To go out you must be playing from your foot and your side needs two clean and two dirty books; with four players your partner must have picked up their foot and played from it.
Here Hand and Foot is played by two, three or four players: four play in two partnerships with partners sitting opposite, two or three play alone. Rules vary widely from table to table. This version follows a widely described partnership game with thirteen-card hands and feet, in which taking the pile takes only its top seven cards; it asks for two clean and two dirty books to go out, without the book of wild cards that some tables also require. Red threes are laid out automatically and replaced from the stock, and you may ask your partner before going out. A tie for the lead after four hands is a draw.
Rule changes
| Rule | Standard Canasta | Hand and Foot |
|---|---|---|
| Cards | Standard CanastaTwo packs with four jokers, 108 cards. | Hand and FootOne more pack than there are players, each with two jokers: 162 cards for two players, 216 for three and 270 for four. |
| Deal | Standard CanastaEleven cards each with four players, thirteen with three and fifteen with two. One card is turned up to start the discard pile. | Hand and FootA hand of thirteen cards and a face-down foot of thirteen more for each player. A red three or wild card turned up for the discard pile goes to the bottom of the stock and the next card is turned instead. |
| The foot | Standard CanastaThere is no second hand: new cards come only from the stock and the discard pile. | Hand and FootWhen your hand runs out, by melding or by discarding its last card, you pick up your foot and carry on with it. Nobody sees a foot before it is picked up, not even its owner. |
| Drawing | Standard CanastaOne card from the stock with four players. With two or three players you draw two and still discard only one. | Hand and FootTwo cards from the stock at every table size, then one discard. |
| Books | Standard CanastaThree or more cards of a rank, with more natural cards than wild cards and at most three wild cards. A meld can keep growing past seven cards. | Hand and FootThree to seven cards of a rank with at most two wild cards, and at least twice as many natural cards as wild cards. A book closes at seven cards, and a side builds only one unfinished book of a rank at a time. |
| Taking the discard pile | Standard CanastaWith two cards from your hand that meld with the top card: a natural pair while the pile is frozen (until your side has melded, or after a wild card was discarded), otherwise a matching card and a wild card will do. Never when a black three or a wild card is on top. | Hand and FootAlways with a natural pair from your hand matching the top card, never when a wild card or a three is on top. You take only the top seven cards: the top card goes into a book with the pair and any more cards of that rank or wild cards you add from your hand, and the other six go into your hand. |
| First meld | Standard CanastaAt least 15 points with a negative score, 50 from 0, 90 from 1,500 and 120 from 3,000. The top card of the discard pile can count towards it. | Hand and FootAt least 50 points in the first hand, 90 in the second, 120 in the third and 150 in the fourth, whatever the score. When you take the pile, the top card and the cards from your hand melded with it count, but not the other cards taken. |
| Threes | Standard CanastaRed threes are laid out at once and replaced from the stock: 100 each, 800 for all four, counted against a side that has not melded. A discarded black three stops the next player taking the pile. | Hand and FootRed threes are laid out and replaced: 100 each for a side that has melded and 100 against for a side that has not, with no bonus for a full set. Each red three still in a foot nobody picked up costs 100. Threes are never melded. |
| Discarding | Standard CanastaAny card but a red three. A discarded wild card freezes the pile. | Hand and FootAny card, wild cards and black threes included. While a wild card or a three lies on top, nobody can take the pile. |
| Going out | Standard CanastaYour side needs one canasta (two in the two-player game). Going out earns 100, or 200 if you meld your whole hand in one turn without having melded before. | Hand and FootYou must be playing from your foot, your side needs two clean and two dirty books, and with four players your partner must have picked up their foot and played from it. Going out earns 100. |
| Bonuses | Standard CanastaMixed canasta 300, natural canasta 500. | Hand and FootDirty book 300, clean book 500. |
| Penalties | Standard CanastaCards left in hand count against you, and a side that has not melded loses its red-three bonus instead of scoring it. | Hand and FootCards left in your hand count against you, and so do the cards of a foot you never picked up. |
| Game length | Standard CanastaHands continue until a side reaches 5,000 points (7,500 with three players) or the target set in the setup. | Hand and FootExactly four hands; the highest total wins and a tie for the lead is a draw. The target score setting does not apply. |
History
Hand and Foot is a North American game related to canasta, and one reference dates its beginnings to the 1970s. Card game references stress that it has numerous variations and no standard rules: tables differ on the number of packs, whether hands and feet hold eleven or thirteen cards, how much of the discard pile a player may take and which books a side needs before it may go out. Most players say it is best with four people in two partnerships.
Its parent game, canasta, is commonly said to have been devised in Montevideo, Uruguay, in 1939 and became a craze in the United States in the 1950s. Hand and Foot has since fed back into the family: the modern American form of canasta is described as borrowing some of its features.