“Bring your strawberry”, “it’s the end of the beans.” and so on. The French language has certain idioms that use food names to imply something completely different. Isn’t that interesting? The idioms are never used in English. We’ve just given the literal translation for you to understand the humor! Here we list some of them — let's find out what they mean, too.
1. Les carottes sont cuites: The carrots are cooked
In France, the interpreted meaning of les carottes (carrots) sont cuites - la-ke-hot-son-kee(t). It is that the situation is too rigid, thus there is very little hope of changing it. For example, when you would like the people to know that the policy is not enough to change the situation, yes, the carrots are cooked! But it’s funny, isn’t it?
Photo: Hermes Rivera
2. En faire tout un fromage: Make a whole cheese about it!
Yes, the French really do say, ‘En faire tout un fromage (cheese)’ - ah(n) fehr too too(n) fruh mazh! Factually, it means starting from not much milk, one can make a whole lot of other things with it. You know..’make up’ things such as cheese? The idiomatic meaning of that is to make a big deal about something. In other words, to exaggerate. But the French love to use cheese as an idiom to express their feelings instead.
Photo: Jez Timms
3. Avoir la pêche: I have the peach.
Avoir la pêche (peach) - ah vwar lah pehsh. It means to have energy. So peach is used in a way to denote a pleasant quality. In the English language, sometimes, you may hear someone tell you you’re a peach. But in the French language, the people say they have the peach!
4. Avoir du pain sur la planche: There’s still bread on the board.
Avoir du pain (bread) sur la planche - ah vwahr du peh(n) sur la pla(n)sh. When used, this French food idiom means that one has a lot to do. It's like saying I have a lot on my plate, but the word 'plate' is replaced with the phrase 'bread on the board'.
We hope that these interesting food idioms made you smile! Just make sure you don't say this in English; you risk being laughed at!