He recently has all his teeth taken out fot stomatitis, as well as some moth eaten teeth they found before taking the others out.
He is not this sweet normally. He was too stoic to catch the pain he was in previously.
Bonus post surgery not happy picture. 
Mine is also toothless by now. You are correct, my vet told my they're using their upper denture / jaw to crush what needs to be crushed and swallow everything else.
I was told to be careful with wet food and meat because this kind of stuff can't be crushed so it should be "bite sized" to allow her to swallow her food easily. But I don't know if this is a general thing or if this was related to an incident when my cat nearly suffocated from a piece of sausage she greedily swallowed without chewing... She's never been the sharpest tool in the shed, but we love her (人 •͈ᴗ•͈)