Food

Bread is a staple article of diet in theory, rather than in practice. There are few who are truly fond of bread in its simplest, most pure, and most healthful state. ... Is there one person in a thousand who would truly enjoy a meal of simple bread of two days old?
~ William Andrus Alcott, M.D., The Young House-keeper, or, Thoughts on Food and Cookery (1838). Chapter VIII: Food From Wheat

Sweet hony loue with gall doth mixe.
~ Sir William Alexander, Earl of Stirling, from Aurora, First Fancies of the Author's Youth (1604). Madrigal I

No banquet's ever to my wish
Unless the talk be the finest dish.
~ William Allingham, from Blackberries Picked Off Many Bushes (1884).

I am now in that happy comfortable state that I do not hesitate to indulge in any fancy in regard to diet, but watch the consequences, and do not continue any course which adds to weight or bulk and consequent discomfort.
~ William Banting, Letter On Corpulence, Addressed to the Public. Fourth Edition (1869).

All wholesome food is caught without a net or a trap.
~ William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790-93). Proverbs of Hell

No man can be a patriot on an empty stomach.
~ William Cowper Brann, in the Iconoclast (4 July 1893). Old Glory

And I find chopsticks frankly distressing. Am I alone in thinking it odd that a people ingenious enough to invent paper, gunpowder, kites and any number of other useful objects, and who have a noble history extending back 3,000 years haven't yet worked out that a pair of knitting needles is no way to capture food?
~ Bill Bryson, Notes From A Small Island (1995).

Clearly, some time ago makers and consumers of American junk food passed jointly through some kind of sensibility barrier in the endless quest for new taste sensations. Now they are a little like those desperate junkies who have tried every known drug and are finally reduced to mainlining toilet bowl cleanser in an effort to get still higher.
~ Bill Bryson, The Lost Continent: Travels in Small Town America (1989).

It is unseasonable and unwholesome in all months that have not an R in their name to eat an oyster.
~ William Butler, Dyet's Dry Dinner (1599).

My teeth are on an edge till I do eat.
~ William Cartwright, The Ordinary (c. 1635). Act II, scene i

We'll bring your friends and ours to this large dinner:
It works the better eaten before witness.
~ William Cartwright, The Ordinary (c. 1635). Act II, scene i

A soup like this is not the work of one man. It is the result of a constantly refined tradition. There are nearly a thousand years of history in this soup.
~ Willa Sibert Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927).

That some of the indigent among us die of scanty food, is undoubtedly true; but vastly more in this community die from eating too much, than from eating too little; vastly more from excess, than starvation.
~ William Ellery Channing (D.D.), A Discourse delivered before the Benevolent Fraternity of Churches, Boston MA (9 April 1835). The Ministry For The Poor

Cheezborger, cheezborger! No fries, cheeps!
~ Bill Charuchas & William "Billy Goat" Sianis, quoted in The Associated Press (1 November 2001). Obituaries in the News

Try the double cheese! It's the best!
~ Bill Charuchas, quoted in The Associated Press (1 November 2001). Obituaries in the News

I like cheese, you should, too!
~ Billy Cheese

A couple of flitches of bacon are worth fifty thousand methodist sermons and religious tracts. ... They are great softeners of the temper and promoters of domestic harmony.
~ William Cobbett, Cottage Economy (1821). Keeping Pigs

Bless the products of the bovines and the vines!
~ William Cole, What a Friend We Have in Cheeses!

What a friend we have in cheeses!
For no food more subtly pleases,
Nor plays so grand a gastronomic part;
Cheese imported -- not domestic --
For we all get indigestic
From all the pasteurizer's Kraft and sodden art.
~ William Cole, What a Friend We Have in Cheeses!

The great dish of New Orleans, and which it claims the honor of having invented, is the GUMBO. There is no dish which at the same time so tickles the palate, satisfies the appetite, furnishes the body with nutriment sufficient to carry on the physical requirements, and costs so little as a Creole gumbo. It is a dinner in itself, being soup, pièce de resistance, entremet and vegetables in one. Healthy, not heating to the stomach and easy of digestion, it should grace every table.
~ William Head Coleman, Historical Sketch Book And Guide To New Orleans And Environs (1885). Chapter IX. A Good Dinner

The confection made of Cacao called Chocolate or Chocoletto which may be had in diverse places in London, at reasonable rates, is of wonderful efficacy for the procreation of children: for it not only vehemently incites to Venus, but causes conception in women ... and besides that it preserves health, for it makes such as take it often to become fat and corpulent, fair and amiable.
~ William Coles, Adam in Eden, or the Paradise of Plants (1657).

I don't eat anything that a dog won't eat. Like sushi. Ever see a dog eat sushi? He just sniffs it and says, "I don't think so." And this is an animal that licks between its legs and sniffs fire hydrants.
~ Billiam Coronel

Fatherhood is telling your daughter that Michael Jackson loves all his fans, but has special feelings for the ones who eat broccoli.
~ Bill Cosby, Fatherhood (1986). Chapter 3

Nobody ever says, "Can I have your beets?"
~ Bill Cosby

[S]pare feast! a radish and an egg.
~ William Cowper, The Task (1785). Book IV. The Winter Evening

The dinner waits, and we are tired.
~ William Cowper, The Diverting History of John Gilpin (1782).

Oh, dainty and delicious!
Food for the gods! Ambrosia for Apicius!
Worthy to thrill the soul of sea-born Venus,
Or titillate the palate of Silenus!
~ William Augustus (W.A.) Croffut, in Buckeye Cookery and Practical Housekeeping (1877). Clam Soup

It is odd how all men develop the notion, as they grow older, that their mothers were wonderful cooks. I have yet to meet the man who will admit that his mother was a kitchen assassin, and nearly poisoned him
~ (William) Robertson Davies, The Papers of Samuel Marchbanks (1985).

If it swims, it's edible.
~ Bill Demmond

Food is to eat, not to frame and hang on the wall.
~ William Denton, Quoted by William E. Geist in The New York Times (28 March 1987).

Some days you can eat your dinner, table and all. And other days you just don't feel like seeing the table.
~ William Gunn Ferguson

The Moon Pie is a bedrock of the country store and rural tradition. It is more than a snack. It is a cultural artifact.
~ William Ferris

I did not say this meat was tough. I just said I didn't see the horse that usually stands outside.
~ W.C. Fields, Never Give a Sucker an Even Break (1941 film).

In terms of fast food and deep understanding of the culture of fast food, I'm your man.
~ Bill Gates

Grown men have been seen fleeing after reading the menu posted outside.
~ William E. Geist

Pressed caviar ... has the consistency of chilled tar.
~ William E. Geist

Life's a pudding full of plums.
Care's a canker that benumbs,
Wherefore waste our elocution
On impossible solution?
Life's a pleasant institution,
Let us take it as it comes!
~ William Schwenck (W.S.) Gilbert, The tangled Skein

One cannot eat breakfast all day,
Nor is it the act of a sinner,
When breakfast is taken away,
To turn his attention to dinner;
And it's not in the range of belief,
To look upon him as a glutton,
Who, when he is tired of beef,
Determines to tackle the mutton.
~ William Schwenck (W.S.) Gilbert, Trial by Jury (1875 opera).

When the first man first clambered from the slime and made his first home on land, what he had for supper that first night was stew.
~ William Goldman, The Princess Bride (1973).

Plenty of cheese here. Plenty of cheese here. Come, come!
~ William Elliot Griffis, from Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks (1918). The Boy Who Wanted More Cheese

In a movie theater a few days ago, I go to the candy counter, and there's this huge menu -- candy, popcorn, ice cream, pickles. They're selling individual pickles. How does this happen? Where am I?
~ William Henry Jackson (Bill) Griffith, in The New York Times (11 July 1999).

Vegetarianism can easily reach religious proportions. Refraining from meat on moral grounds serves to dignify feelings of guilt toward sad-eyed, furry creatures and substitutes righteousness for squeamishness.
~ William Henry Jackson (Bill) Griffith, Griffith Observatory "Religious Nuts" Comic Strip (1977).

The world offers a million varieties of mind food.
~ William H. Hamby, in The Christian Register (17 November 1904). Choosing the Past

Eating an artichoke is like getting to know someone really well.
~ Willi Hastings

The key, it seems, is to allow children to respond to (their) well-developed internal cues (of hunger and satiety) rather than to parental pressure to consume a specific amount of food or a specific food. The challenge, now, is to determine how to do this.
~ Dr. William C. Heird, Reuters (27 February 2002). Mom's Worry Over Kid's Weight Ups Child's Fat Risk

As men to a feast we fared, the work of the Will to do.
~ William Ernest (W.E.) Henley, from The Song of the Sword, and Other Verses (1892). Rhymes and Rhythms. III (To R.F.B.)

This is no brekefast: but a morsell to drynke with.
~ William Horman, Vulgaria (1519).

In the vegetable world, there is nothing so innocent, so confiding in its expression, as the small green face of the freshly shelled spring pea.
~ William Wallace Irwin, The Garrulous Gourmet (1952).

How can you eat anything with eyes.
~ Will Kellogg

Make your transparent Sweet-meats truly nice
With Indian Sugar and Arabian Spice;
And let your various Creams incircl'd be
With swelling fruit ravish'd from the Tree.
~ William King, The Art of Cookery; in imitation of Horace's Art of Poetry (1708).

'Tis the dessert that graces all the feast,
For an ill end disparages the rest.
~ William King, The Art of Cookery; in imitation of Horace's Art of Poetry (1708).

Unless some Sweetness at the Bottom lye,
Who cares for all the crinkling of the Pye?
~ William King, The Art of Cookery; in imitation of Horace's Art of Poetry (1708).

Where the corn is full of kernels
And the colonels full of corn.
~ William James Lampton, Kentucky

I venture to maintain that there are multitudes to whom the necessity of discharging the duties of a butcher would be so inexpressibly painful and revolting, that if they could obtain flesh diet on no other condition, they would relinquish it for ever.
~ William Edward Hartpole (E.H.) Lecky, History of European Morals, Volume I (1869). Chapter I. The Natural History of Morals

At a dinner party one should eat wisely but not too well, and talk well but not too wisely.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, from A Writer's Notebook (1949).

To eat well in England you should have breakfast three times a day.
~ W. Somerset Maugham

Bad cooks -- and the utter lack of reason in the kitchen -- have delayed human development longest and impaired it most.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

We are all dietetic sinners; only a small percent of what we eat nourishes us, the balance goes to waste and loss of energy.
~ William Osler, quoted in Sir William Osler: Aphorisms from His Bedside Teachings and Writings (1950).

Eat therefore to live, and do not live to eat.
~ William Penn, Some Fruits of Solitude (1693). Part I. Temperance

Have wholesome, but not costly Food, and be rather cleanly than dainty in ordering it.
~ William Penn, Some Fruits of Solitude (1693). Part I. Temperance

If thou rise with an Appetite, thou art sure never to sit down without one.
~ William Penn, Some Fruits of Solitude (1693). Part I. Temperance

The receipts of cookery are swelled to a volume; but a good stomach excels them all.
~ William Penn, Some Fruits of Solitude (1693). Part I. Temperance

As a rookie participating in the Super Bowl of competitive eating, the odds are stacked against me bringing home the championship. But just as the NFL found out in 1985 when I entered the league and scored a touchdown during a Super Bowl victory, the world of competitive eating is about to be turned upside-down by The Fridge.
~ William ("The Refrigerator") Perry (of Nathan's Famous Fourth of July International Hot Dog Eating Contest; July 2004)

By nature and doctrines I am addicted to the habit of discovering choice places wherein to feed.
~ William Sydney Porter (O. Henry), The Heart of the West (1904). Cupid a La Carte

Dessert is probably the most important stage of the meal, since it will be the last thing your guests remember before they pass out all over the table.
~ William Powell

I liked Taco Bell until a few days ago, when I realized taco spelled backward is O Cat.
~ Billy Riback

An onion can make people cry but there's never been a vegetable that can make people laugh.
~ Will Rogers

Some guy invented "Vitamin A" out of a carrot. I'll bet he can't invent a good meal out of one.
~ Will Rogers, in The Will Rogers Book (1961).

[T]he question of the world today is not how to eat soup, but how to get soup to eat.
~ Will Rogers, The Illiterate Digest (1924). Defending My Soup Plate Position (aka From Nuts to Soup)

We are the first nation to starve to death in a storehouse that's overfilled with everything we want.
~ Will Rogers, Daily Telegrams (26 November 1930)

Why ma'am, there's nothing in these but eggs, flour, butter, and a little sugar. Nothing in them will hurt you a bit. Just don't eat a box of them is all.
~ William Rosenberg (on donuts).

In the lexicon of lip-smacking, an epicure is fastidious in his choice and enjoyment of food, just a soupcon more expert than a gastronome; a gourmet is a connoisseur of the exotic, taste buds attuned to the calibrations of deliciousness, who savors the masterly techniques of great chefs; a gourmand is a hearty bon vivant who enjoys food without truffles and flourishes; a glutton overindulges greedily, the word rooted in Latin for "one who devours." ... After eating, an epicure gives a thin smile of satisfaction; a gastronome, burping into his napkin, praises the food in a magazine; a gourmet, repressing his burp, criticizes the food in the same magazine; a gourmand belches happily and tells everybody where he ate; a glutton embraces the white porcelain altar, or, more plainly, he barfs.
~ William L. Safire

A dish fit for the gods.
~ William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar. Act II, scene i

A man may fish with the worm that hath eat of a king, and eat of the fish that hath fed of that worm.
~ William Shakespeare, Hamlet. Act IV, scene ii

Give them great meals of beef and iron and steel, they will eat like wolves and fight like devils.
~ William Shakespeare, King Henry V. Act III, scene vii

Here is everything advantageous to life.
~ William Shakespeare, The Tempest. Act II, scene i

I am a great eater of beef, and I believe that does harm to my wit.
~ William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night. Act I, scene iii

Let it serve for table-talk.
~ William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice. Act III, scene v

Mine eyes smell onions; I shall weep anon.
~ William Shakespeare, All's Well that Ends Well. Act V, scene iii

My cake is dough.
~ William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew. Act V, scene i

She is spread of late
Into a goodly bulk: good time encounter her!
~ William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure. Act II, scene i

Small cheer and great welcome makes a merry feast.
~ William Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors. Act III, scene i

Sweet, sweet, sweet poison for the age's tooth.
~ William Shakespeare, King John. Act I, scene i

Things sweet to taste prove in digestion sour.
~ William Shakespeare, King Richard II. Act I, scene iii

Unquiet meals make ill digestions.
~ William Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors. Act V, scene i

What say you to a piece of beef and mustard?
~ William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew. Act IV, scene iii

[W]ho riseth from a feast
With that keen appetite that he sits down?
~ William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice. Act II, scene vi

Don't just shove food into your mouth. Taste the flavor exploding in your mouth. Appreciate the texture. Honor your food with the time you take.
~ William Shatner, The Associated Press (15 November 2001). Shatner at 70 Is Busier Than Ever

Eating fuels the body. Eating well fuels the soul.
~ William Shatner, Iron Chef USA (16 November 2001). Episode One: Showdown in Las Vegas

Man's but a poor weak creature at best,
Till the fiend in the belly is lulled to rest.
~ William Wetmore Story, from Graffiti d'Italia (1868). Giannone

So that for all things out of a garden, either of salads or fruits, a poor man will eat better, that has one of his own, than a rich man that has none.
~ Sir William Temple, 1st Baronet, from Miscellanea, Part II (1690). Upon The Gardens of Epicurus: or, Of Gardening, in the Year 1685

Despair is perfectly compatible with a good dinner, I promise you.
~ William Makepeace Thackeray, Lovel the Widower (1861). Chapter VI: Cecilia's Successor

Dinner was made for eatin', not for talkin'.
~ William Makepeace Thackeray, in Frazer's Magazine (1837). The Yellowplush Correspondence. Number I. Fashnable Fax and Polite Annygoats

I own it tastes well, the bread which you earn yourself.
~ William Makepeace Thackeray, The History of Pendennis (1848-1850), Volume I. Chapter XXXII: In which the Printer's Devil comes to the Door

Sir, Respect Your Dinner; idolize it, enjoy it properly. You will be by many hours in the week, many weeks in the year, and many years in your life, the happier if you do.
~ William Makepeace Thackeray, in Early And Late Papers: Hitherto Uncollected (1867). Memorials of Gormandizing

If you can't control your peanut butter, you can't expect to control your life.
~ Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes (1 April 1993).

Feast, and your halls are crowded;
Fast, and the world goes by.
~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox, from Poems of Passion (1883). Miscellanious Poems. Solitude

No cookie ... not now ... not ever ... never!
~ Andy Williams (responding to "The Williams Weirdos" character, Cookie Bear's request for a cookie), The Andy Williams Show (1969-71).

When you eat in space, you can really play with your food. We could squeeze a blob of orange juice out of its container and watch it float around. Then you puncture the blob with a straw and just suck it up.
~ Dafydd (Dave) Rhys Williams, The McGill Reporter, Vol. 31, No. 3 (8 October 1998). Ground control to Dr. Dave

Page one is a diet, page two is a chocolate cake. It's a no-win situation.
~ Kim Williams, (on "women's magazines," recalled on her death; 6 August 1986)

After getting my blood tested and having a nutritionist show me exactly which foods work best as fuel for me, I can feel the machine working efficiently, my body grabbing at the food after workouts.
~ Ricky Williams, ESPN The Magazine (16 September 2002). Redemption Song

Cholesterol is not a bad substance; it is made by virtually every cell in our bodies and is necessary to life. Deposits of it in our arteries is what is bad ... there is much to be said for the idea that if we eat the right foods and get the right assortment of [nutrients], cholesterol and cholesterol deposits will take care of themselves.
~ Roger J. Williams, Ph.D., D.Sc., The Wonderful World Within You (1977).

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox
and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast
Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold
~ William Carlos Williams, from Collected Poems, 1921-1931 (1934). This Is Just to Say

The kitchen is a chemical laboratory in which are conducted a number of chemical processes by which our food is converted from its crude state to a condition more suitable for digestion and nutrition, and made more agreeable to the palate.
~ William Mattieu Williams, The Chemistry of Cookery (1885). Chapter I: Introductory

When common sense and true sentiment supplant mere unreasoning prejudice, vegetables oils and vegetable fats will largely supplant those of animal origin in every element of our dietary.
~ William Mattieu Williams, The Chemistry of Cookery (1885). Chapter VII: Frying

You can say this for these ready-mixes -- the next generation isn't going to have any trouble making pies exactly like mother used to make.
~ Earl Wilson

If I had the choice between smoked salmon and tinned salmon, I'd have it tinned. With vinegar.
~ Harold Wilson, in Observer (11 November 1962).

Mosquitoes remind us that we are not as high up on the food chain as we think.
~ Tom Wilson

There was work and there was no work. If you worked you ate. If there was no work you went hungry. You didn't beg and you didn't steal; the unwritten code excluded both.
~ William Woodruff, The Road to Nab End: A Lancashire Childhood (2000).

Although the frankfurter originated in Frankfurt, Germany, we have long since made it our own, a twin pillar of democracy along with Mom's apple pie. In fact, now that Mom's apple pie comes frozen and baked by somebody who isn't Mom, the hot dog stands alone. What it symbolizes remains pure, even if what it contains does not.
~ William K. Zinsser, in Life magazine (9 October 1969).

The frank comes wrapped in its own napkin and is soon gone without a trace. It is the ultimate food of the disposable society.
~ William K. Zinsser, in Life magazine (9 October 1969).