Food

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

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).

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).

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

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 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 (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

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

[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 Croffut, Clam Soup

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

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).

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).

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

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

Statistics show that of those who contract the habit of eating, very few will survive.
~ William Wallace Irwin

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).

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

At a dinner party one should eat wisely but not too well, and talk well but not too wisely.
~ W. Somerset Maugham

Dinner, a time when . . . one should eat wisely but not too well, and talk well but not too wisely.
~ W. Somerset Maugham

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

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

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

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

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

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 (1907). 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

[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)

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).

I, personally, have succeeded in living nearly eighty-five years without taking any trouble about my diet.
~ Bertrand Arthur William Russell, (25 March 1957).

Undoubtedly the desire for food has been, and still is, one of the main causes of great political events.
~ Bertrand Arthur William Russell

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

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

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

My cake is dough.
~ William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Feast, and your halls are crowded;
Fast, and the world goes by.
~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Poems of Passion (1883). 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, This Is Just to Say

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). 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).

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).