2008 Food Quotes of the Year: Zing!

With Christmas on the horizon (seriously, it’s riding a horse and headed straight for us), we’re taking a short break from CHG’s usual seriousness (er … yeah), and instead presenting a retrospective of our favorite Thursday Quotes of the Week. Enjoy!

FOOD QUOTES: FAIRLY PROFOUND

“Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast.” – Oscar Wilde

"Too few people understand a really good sandwich." –James Beard

“Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are.” -Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

“I was 32 when I started cooking. Up until then, I just ate.” – Julia Child

“So long as you have food in your mouth, you have solved all questions for the time being.” – Franz Kafka

"Sir, respect your dinner: idolize it, enjoy it properly. You will be many hours in the week, many weeks in the year, and many years in your life happier if you do." - William Makepeace Thackeray

“They take great pride in making their dinner cost much; I take my pride in making my dinner cost so little.” - Henry David Thoreau

FOOD QUOTES: TV & MOVIES

“Annie, there's a big lobster behind the refrigerator. I can't get it out. This thing's heavy. Maybe if I put a little dish of butter sauce here with a nutcracker, it will run out the other side.” – Alvy Singer (Woody Allen), Annie Hall

“Heba wonders why Phil would go to her friend and ‘blasphemy’ her. Yeah, and right after she turned Gatorade into wine and fed the multitudes with a 100-calorie snack pack.” – Potes on The Biggest Loser from Television Without Pity

CLIFF: Hey Carla, I have a potato that looks like Richard Milhouse Nixon.
CARLA: Big deal. Show me one that doesn't.
-Cheers

“An apple a day keeps anyone away if you throw it hard enough.” – Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

"As you know, the hot dog was invented in America when a family of raccoons wandered into a toothpaste factory." – Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report

PETER: Lois, there's a message in my Alpha Bits. It says "OOOOOO"!
LOIS: Peter, those are Cheerios.
-The Family Guy

ROSS: I honestly don't know if I'm hungry or horny.
CHANDLER: Stay out of my freezer.
-Friends

“You know the family motto: ‘We’re Conners. We gotta eat.’” – Dan Conner (John Goodman), Roseanne

“I don’t return fruit. Fruit’s a gamble. I know that going in.” – Jerry Seinfeld, Seinfeld

‘I do wish we could chat longer, but … I'm having an old friend for dinner. Bye.” – Hannibal Lecter (Anthony Hopkins), Silence of the Lambs

"If wishes and buts were clusters of nuts we'd all have a bowl of granola." – Geoffrey Jellineck (Paul Dinello), Strangers with Candy

FOOD QUOTES: COMEDIANS

“When your Super Bowl guests arrive, they should find a mound of potato chips large enough to conceal a pony sitting in front of the television. For nutritional balance, you should also put out a bowl of carrot sticks. If you have no carrot sticks, you can use pinecones, or used electrical fuses, because nobody will eat them anyway. This is no time for nutritional balance: This is the Super Bowl, for God's sake.” – Dave Barry

"Anytime a person goes into a delicatessen and orders a pastrami on white bread, somewhere a Jew dies." – Milton Berle

"I'm not a vegetarian because I love animals. I'm a vegetarian because I hate plants." – A. Whitney Brown

“The worst gift is a fruitcake. There is only one fruitcake in the entire world, and people keep sending it to each other.” – Johnny Carson

“I like baked potatoes. I don't have a microwave oven, and it takes forever to bake a potato in a conventional oven. Sometimes I'll just throw one in there, even if I don't want one, because by the time it's done, who knows?” – Mitch Hedberg

“Rice is great when you are hungry and you want 2,000 of something.” – Mitch Hedberg

“I like fruit baskets because it gives you the ability to mail someone a piece of fruit without appearing insane. Like, if someone just mailed you an apple you'd be like, 'Huh? What the hell is this?' But if it's in a fruit basket you're like 'This is nice!’” – Demetri Martin

“I like to use 'I Can't Believe it's Not Butter' on my toast in the morning, because sometimes when I eat breakfast, I like to be incredulous. ‘How was breakfast?’ ‘Unbelievable.’” – Demetri Martin

“I had teeth that stuck out so far, I used to eat other kids' candy bars by accident.” – Rita Rudner

“Part of the secret of success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside.” – Mark Twain

“I went to a restaurant that serves ‘breakfast at any time.’ So I ordered French Toast during the Renaissance.” - Steven Wright

FOOD QUOTES: OTHER

“You better cut the pizza in four pieces, because I'm not hungry enough to eat six.” - Yogi Berra

“You know, the only thing worse than an American to an Italian is an Italian from the next village.” – Anthony Bourdain

“I'm guest judging again next week. Which means I know what happens. And while I am precluded from discussing future broadcasts by a confidentiality agreement rivaling the NSA's in the severity of its penalties for unauthorized disclosure, I can reveal this: There will be a SlaughterFest of Horror, an Orgy of Bloodletting, Partial Nudity, Flammable Liquids, Unspeakable Misuse of Power Tools and Small Woodland Creatures, and the Plaintive Wailing of the Doomed. It will make Altamont look like Lilith Fair.” - Anthony Bourdain blogging about Top Chef

“You can never have enough garlic. With enough garlic, you can eat The New York Times.” – Morley Safer

BEVERAGES

JACK: Lemon, you're here early.
LEMON: Well I gave up caffeine so I've been going to bed at 5:30.
-30 Rock

"Why does man kill? He kills for food. And not only food - frequently there must be a beverage." - Woody Allen

"Not all chemicals are bad. Without chemicals such as hydrogen and oxygen, for example, there would be no way to make water, a vital ingredient in beer." -Dave Barry

“Without question, the greatest invention in the history of mankind is beer. Oh, I grant you that the wheel was also a fine invention, but the wheel does not go nearly as well with pizza.” – Dave Barry

PEGGY: You're 12 years old, and drinking a beer.
BOBBY: I didn't even like it.
HANK: Now you're just trying to get me mad.
-King of the Hill

“If life gives you lemons, make some kind of fruity juice.” - Conan O'Brien

“You know, most people don't know the difference between apple cider and apple juice, but I do. Now here's a little trick to help you remember. If it's clear and yella', you've got juice there, fella. If it's tangy and brown, you're in cider town.” – Ned Flanders, The Simpsons

RELATIONSHIPS

"Could we have some more virgin olive oil? This one's kind of trampy." – Ellen DeGeneres

“We dare not trust our wit for making our house pleasant to our friend, so we buy ice cream.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

"I like my coffee like I like my women. In a plastic cup." – Eddie Izzard

CRYSTAL: How do you like your marshmallows, Roseanne?
ROSEANNE: Like my men, crispy on the outside and stuck to the end of a fork.
-Roseanne

SOCIAL COMMENTARY

“You know the great irony is that people think you have to have money to enjoy fine food, which is a shame.” – Ted Allen

"I wake up every morning in a bed that’s too small, drive my daughter to a school that’s too expensive, and then I go to work to a job for which I get paid too little, but on Pretzel Day? Well, I like Pretzel Day." – Stanley Hudson (Leslie David Baker), The Office

“We got so much food in America we're allergic to food. Allergic to food! Hungry people ain't allergic to s**t. You think anyone in Rwanda's got a f**king lactose intolerance?!”- Chris Rock

“You can't be happy that fire cooks your food and be mad it burns your fingertips.” – Chris Rock

DIETS

"I am not a glutton. I am an explorer of food." – Erma Bombeck

“I’ve been on a constant diet for the last two decades. I’ve lost a total of 789 pounds. By all accounts, I should be hanging from a charm bracelet.” – Erma Bombeck

“I gotta work out. I keep saying it all the time. I keep saying I gotta start working out. It's been about two months since I've worked out. And I just don't have the time. Which, uh … is odd. Because I have the time to go out to dinner. And, uh … and watch TV. And get a bone density test. And, uh ... try to figure out what my phone number spells in words.” – Ellen DeGeneres

“Never eat more than you can lift.” – Miss Piggy

“Everything you see I owe to spaghetti.” – Sophia Loren

“I eat pretty much whatever I want. I don't have a strict diet. It's all about cramming in as many calories into my system as I possibly can. To be honest with you, I have a tough time keeping weight on.” –U.S. swimmer Michael Phelps, on his 10000-calorie daily intake

PASSINGS: ESTELLE GETTY

“My name is Sophia Petrillo and my idea of a good psychiatrist is a bartender who pours without a spout.” – as Sophia Petrillo on The Golden Girls

“Sorry, Dorothy. There are two things a Sicilian won't do: Lie about pizza, and file a tax return.” – as Sophia Petrillo on The Golden Girls

“If this sauce were a person, I'd get naked and make love to it.” – as Sophia Petrillo on The Golden Girls

“I hate Jell-O. If God wanted peaches suspended in midair, He would have filled them with helium” – as Sophia Petrillo on The Golden Girls

DOROTHY: MA, WOULD YOU PLEASE STOP THAT!
SOPHIA: These are FRITOS, Dorothy. What do you want me to do, swallow them whole?
-The Golden Girls

PASSINGS: GEORGE CARLIN

“Fussy eater is a euphemism for big pain in the ass."

“Two heart attacks has changed my diet, but I still cook bacon for the smell.”

"Another terrible sounding word: headcheese. AUGH! I can't even look at the sign."

“People who pay for inexpensive items with a credit card. … Folks, take my word for this, Raisinettes is NOT a major purchase. No one should be paying the bank eighteen percent interest on Tic-Tacs.”

“And, of course, the funniest food: ‘kumquats.’ I don't even bring them home. I sit there laughing and they go to waste.”

QUOTES FROM THE OFFICE POST

"First rule in roadside beet sales, put the most attractive beets on top. The ones that make you pull the car over and go, 'Wow, I need this beet right now.' Those are the money beets." – Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson)

“Yes, I have decided to shun Andy Bernard for the next three years, which I'm looking forward to. It's an Amish technique; it's like slapping someone with silence. I was shunned from the age of 4 until my 6th birthday, for not saving the excess oil from a can of tuna.” – Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson)

QUOTES FROM THE SIMPSONS POST

“To alcohol: the cause of and solution to all of life's problems.” – Homer

“Sorry Lis, I can't be a vegetarian. I love the taste of death!” – Bart

“Lisa, I made you some homemade Pepsi for the dance; it's a little thick but the price is right.” - Marge

“If God didn't want us to eat animals, why did he make them out of meat?” - Homer

"Donuts. Is there anything they can't do?" - Homer

“Nuts and gum...together at last!” - Homer

MARGE: Ooh, Lisa! Is that too spicy for you?
LISA: I can see through time!

HOMER: See Marge, I told you I could deep fry my shirt.
MARGE: I didn't say you couldn't, I said you probably shouldn't.

HOMER: Are you saying you're never going to eat any animal again? What about bacon?
LISA: No.
HOMER: Ham?
LISA: No.
HOMER: Pork chops?
LISA: Dad, those all come from the same animal.
HOMER: Heh heh heh. Ooh, yeah, right, Lisa. A wonderful, magical animal.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Joyous Kwanzaa, and WOOO New Year, everybody!

(Photos courtesy of MySpace Mags, Stuck in Iowa, Home Run Derby, UK Telegraph, and About.com.)

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