Top 10 Food Quotations -- With a Prize
Thanks, Bucky! EL
Somewhere along the way, I started jotting down quotations that stuck me as insightful or funny or potentially useful for staff meeting arguments in a little spiral-bound notebook that I carried around with me in my briefcase. Thoughts like, “Sooner or later, you’re going to have to be your own hero” and “Work is for people who never learned how to fish.”
When EL asked for a guest Top 10 to cover her while she was on vacation, I thought to myself, “Whoa, this should bring Jay C. back to the blog.” Ha Ha Ha … I didn’t think that. I’m just kidding. ...
I went into my collection of quotations (now stored on Microsoft Word) and dug out some of my favorites that would meet the pesky “food-related” requirement. I actually had a difficult time narrowing it down to 10.
Feel free to add your own, and if somebody adds the one that should be on the list but isn’t, because I’ve seen it in D@L comments a few times, they will win a prize. (To keep things on the up and up, I’ve told EL what the winning quotation is.)Enjoy your vacation, Elizabeth. We know you deserve it.
1) “My favorite animal is steak.” ~ Fran Lebowitz
2) “Tomatoes and oregano make it Italian; wine and tarragon make it French. Sour cream makes it Russian; lemon and cinnamon make it Greek. Soy sauce makes it Chinese; garlic makes it good.” ~ Alice May Brock
3) “I've been on a diet for two weeks and all I've lost is two weeks.” ~ Totie Fields
4) “Edible, adj.: Good to eat, and wholesome to digest, as a worm to a toad, a toad to a snake, a snake to a pig, a pig to a man, and a man to a worm.” ~ Ambrose Bierce
5) “What is patriotism but the love of the food one ate as a child?” ~ Lin Yutang
6) “Good bread is the most fundamentally satisfying of all foods; good bread with fresh butter, the greatest of feasts!” ~ James Beard
7) “He was a very valiant man who first adventured on eating oysters.” ~ James I
8) “A fruit is a vegetable with looks and money. Plus, if you let fruit rot, it turns into wine, something Brussels sprouts never do.” ~ P.J. O'Rourke
9) “Food is not about impressing people. It's about making them feel comfortable.” ~ Ina Garten
10) “Never eat more than you can lift.” – Miss Piggy
(Sun archives)
Comments
Bucky, great list!
I would add "If you're afraid of butter, use cream"--Julia Child.
Posted by: Dahlink | January 19, 2010 6:38 AM
Good list, Bucky! My personal favorite is "don't eat anything bigger than your head". But, I don't know who to give the credit for that one too.
Posted by: Joyce W. | January 19, 2010 6:53 AM
De gustibus non est disputandum.
Posted by: Laura Lee | January 19, 2010 7:22 AM
"mmmmmm donuts"
-Homer Simpson
Posted by: Mark | January 19, 2010 8:21 AM
"I will not eat oysters. I want my food dead -- not sick, not wounded -- dead."
- Woody Allen
Posted by: pgp | January 19, 2010 9:23 AM
I've always been partial to Ogden Nash.
Candy is dandy but liquor is quicker.
Posted by: Matt | January 19, 2010 9:29 AM
My favorite food-related Ogden Nash ditty might be:
"Shake, shake the ketchup bottle…none’ll come and then a lot’ll"
Posted by: Hal Laurent | January 19, 2010 9:54 AM
"I went to a restaurant that serves 'Breakfast at any time'.
So I ordered French Toast during the Renaissance."
-Steven Wright
Posted by: pgp | January 19, 2010 10:26 AM
"Ask not what you can do for your country...Ask what's for lunch."
Orson Welles
Posted by: Mags | January 19, 2010 11:53 AM
"Eat my shorts."
Bart Simpson
Posted by: OldPhil | January 19, 2010 12:07 PM
More Fran Leibowitz; "Ask your child what he wants for dinner only if he's buying."
“Vegetables are interesting but lack a sense of purpose when unaccompanied by a good cut of meat”
“No animal should ever jump up on the dining-room furniture unless absolutely certain that he can hold his own in the conversation.”
“If you're going to America, bring your own food.”
Posted by: Lissa | January 19, 2010 12:41 PM
Anthelme Brillat-Savarin: "Tell me what you eat and I'll tell you what you are."
It was the quote that ran at the beginning of Iron Chef when it was still being broadcast from Japan.
Posted by: renfield1969 | January 19, 2010 12:58 PM
"I would gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today". J Wellington Wimpy of Popeye fame.
Posted by: LEC | January 19, 2010 1:25 PM
"'You are what you eat,' said a wise old man.
Lord, if that's true, I'm a garbage can."
Victor Buono, "A Fat Man's Prayer"
Posted by: Bob | January 19, 2010 1:27 PM
"Please, Sir, I want some more." - Oliver Twist
"Food has replaced sex in my life, now I can't get in my pants." - unknown, but realistic.
Posted by: Odie B | January 19, 2010 2:14 PM
"These Pretzels are Making Me Thirsty"
Cosmo Krammer
Posted by: Tony | January 19, 2010 3:28 PM
"The discovery of a new dish confers more happiness on humanity, than the discovery of a new star."
Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin
Posted by: Westminster | January 19, 2010 4:28 PM
Great list!
How about...
Sex is good, but not as good as fresh, sweet corn. ~Garrison Keillor
Red meat is not bad for you. Now blue-green meat, that’s bad for you! ~Tommy Smothers
There is one thing more exasperating than a wife who can cook and won't, and that's a wife who can't cook and will. ~Robert Frost
Posted by: Jack Ziegler | January 19, 2010 4:35 PM
If God had not intended for us to eat animals, how come He made them out of meat? -attributed to Sarah Palin (but it's been around for a lot longer than she has)
Posted by: bawlmerbeav | January 19, 2010 5:24 PM
Jack Ziegler posted:
"Sex is good, but not as good as fresh, sweet corn." ~Garrison Keillor
I feel sorry for Garrison Keillor!
Posted by: pgp | January 19, 2010 7:00 PM
Several from M.F.K. Fisher:
“People ask me: "Why do you write about food, and eating, and drinking? Why don't you write about the struggle for power and security, and about love, the way the others do?" . . . The easiest answer is to say that, like most other humans, I am hungry.”
“. . . most bereaved souls crave nourishment more tangible than prayers: they want a steak.”
“There are many of us who cannot but feel dismal about the future of various cultures. Often it is hard not to agree that we are becoming culinary nitwits, dependent upon fast foods and mass kitchens and megavitamins for our basically rotten nourishment.”
Posted by: pgp | January 19, 2010 7:08 PM
All very good comments, especially Old Phil's "Eat My Shorts" which, while made famous my Bart Simpson,predates him considerably. It was 1966, on a high school basketball court when Freddie McAlister got called for traveling and said to the ref, "Eat my shorts" that I first heard that expression. Freddie got a "T" and I got pulled out of the game because I was laughing too hard to continue playing.
Alas, no winner yet...
Posted by: Bucky | January 20, 2010 8:17 AM
Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish, and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.
Captcha - outright arsonist. oh how well it knows me...
Posted by: Doug | January 20, 2010 8:35 AM
"I'll have what she's having" - When Harry Met Sally
Posted by: Trixie | January 20, 2010 8:39 AM
I like how Doug thinks.
Posted by: Bucky | January 20, 2010 8:50 AM
Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we shall die.
I'm unsure of the origin, but, I remember my World History teacher in high school attribute this to Charles II (a.k.a., The Merrie Monarch). However, a couple of websites indicate this phrase originated from passages in the Bible.
Posted by: chris | January 20, 2010 1:31 PM
Eat stuff.
When it's gone, eat other stuff.
Posted by: RayRay | January 20, 2010 2:03 PM
"Let them eat cake!" - MA
Posted by: Lone Lady | January 20, 2010 4:53 PM
Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. - Michael Pollan
relations nannied - What I need to go out.
Posted by: Patrick Mc | January 25, 2010 1:56 AM