In our last post, we talked about being “corny.” And that got me to thinking about how frequently we use food as a simile or metaphor—and how often it features in our popular sayings and proverbs. Here are just a few examples…
Cool as a cucumber
Skinny as a string bean
As American as apple pie
The apple of his eye
A peaches and cream completion
As easy as pie (or a piece of cake!)
Like two peas in a pod
In a pickle (or maybe a jam?)
Slow as molasses
Egg on your face
Full of beans
Sweet as candy
What have I missed?
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Actually, it’s “slow as molasses in January.” It pours pretty fast when it’s warm.
Kitty Williams Reply:
August 10th, 2011 at 9:14 AM
Oh yeah, I guess that’s right. It pours pretty fast right now here in Tucson!
Red as a beet.
Kitty Williams Reply:
August 10th, 2011 at 9:15 AM
That’s a good one!
Kitty, What a savory post! And already some of our readers have sent us more sayings. This is a perfect time to let our local readers know about our ARTiculations lecture at the CRIZMAC Marketplace on Nov. 11, 2011, titled, Delicous Art. We’ll look and learn about art that has food as the subject. It’s a mouth-watering presentation, so I am inviting our readers to check out our calendar at http://www.crizmac.com for details.
Kitty Williams Reply:
August 10th, 2011 at 9:15 AM
Yes, that should be a delicious lecture!
“Hot enough to fry an egg!” Here on our 44th consecutive day over 100 degrees, I think this a lot. I’m even considering working a test of this metaphor into my lesson plans when school starts.
And “cuts like butter” — though most of our butter is more spoon consistency right now.
How about a couple of phrases that have mostly fallen out of style — peachy keen and going bananas?
Kitty Williams Reply:
August 12th, 2011 at 9:42 AM
Those are all good–I’d forgotten peachy keen! Jon Stewart has segment about all the weather people out there and the gimics (like frying eggs on the sidewalk!) they resort to to demonstrate the temperature extremes. Pretty funny.