Food Proverbs

Sayings about Food

Even the best words bring no food. ~ Gambian Proverb

The conversation of the wise concerns ideas; that of the intelligent is about ideas; the common folk talk about food. ~ Chinese Proverb

Those who are at one regarding food are at one in life. ~ Malawian Proverb

The eagle does not feed on flies. ~ Turkish Proverb

He who does not feed the dog feeds the thief. ~ Chinese Proverb

A bird never flew so high but it had to come to the ground for food. ~ Dutch Proverb

Conversation is the food of the ears. ~ Trinidadian Proverb

Where love sets the table food tastes at its best. ~ French Proverb

A mother can more easily feed seven children than seven children can feed one mother. ~ French Proverb

It is sad when the elephant dies, but the whole tribe can feed on it. ~ Sudanese Proverb

God feeds the birds that use their wings. ~ Danish Proverb

If you are looking for a fly in your food it means that you are full. ~ South African Proverb

Food tastes best when you eat it with your own spoon. ~ Danish Proverb

The village feeds the town. ~ Bulgarian Proverb

The god who made the mouth will provide the food. ~ Nepalese Proverb

If you feed the mouth, the eye becomes shy. ~ Palestinian Proverb

All food is fit to eat, but not all words are fit to speak. ~ Haitian Proverb

Feed your horse as a friend, mount him as an enemy. ~ Croatian Proverb

Fine words do not produce food. ~ Nigerian Proverb

Even food can attack. ~ New Zealander Proverb

To feed the ambition in your heart is like carrying a tiger under your arm. ~ Chinese Proverb

No matter how high a bird can fly, it still has to look for food on the ground. ~ Danish Proverb

He that feeds himself from waiting could die of hunger. ~ Danish Proverb

The impotent man does not eat spicy foods. ~ Congolese Proverb

Nine gamblers could not feed a single rooster. ~ Yugoslavian Proverb

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. ~ Chinese Proverb

It is not good for all our wishes to be filled; through sickness we recognize the value of health; through evil, the value of good; through hunger, the value of food; through exertion, the value of rest. ~ Greek Proverb

A man overboard, a mouth less to feed. ~ Dutch Proverb

Beauty is the eye’s food but the soul’s sorrow. ~ German Proverbs

Even the best cooking pot will not produce food. ~ African Proverb

You are only master of food that you haven’t yet eaten. ~ Tibetan Proverb

Warm bed, cold food. ~ Serbian Proverb

If you watch your pot, your food will not burn. ~ Mauritanian Proverb

God gives all birds their food but does not drop it into their nests. ~ Danish Proverb

Food you will not eat you do not boil. ~ African Proverb

Feed the raven and he’ll peck out your eyes. ~ Spanish Proverb

Mere words do not feed the friars. ~ Irish Proverb

Old praise dies unless you feed it. ~ English Proverb

One dish does not feed two gluttons. ~ French Proverb

What the wolf mourns is food for the fox. ~ Arabian Proverb

When your luck deserts you, even cold food burns. ~ Zambian Proverb

The food which is prepared has no master. ~ Malagasy Proverb

They ate our food, and forgot our names. ~ Tunisian Proverb

Three things give us hardy strength: sleeping on hairy mattresses, breathing cold air, and eating dry food. ~ Welsh Proverbs

Nature gave us two cheeks instead of one to make it easier to eat hot food. ~ Ghanaian Proverb

Enough food and a pipe full of tobacco makes you equal to the immortals. ~ Chinese Proverb

If you are too sparing with the cat’s food, the rats will eat your ears. ~ Lebanese Proverb

The poor looks for food and the rich man for appetite. ~ Indian Proverbs

A golden cage does not feed the bird. ~ Italian Proverb

One who speaks fair words feeds you with an empty spoon. ~ Italian Proverbs

A nightingale doesn’t feed on songs. ~ Russian Proverb

Art finds its food everywhere. ~ Danish Proverb

No matter how much you feed a wolf, he will always return to the forest. ~ Russian Proverb

First food, then religion. ~ Afghan Proverb

The crow pecks at the ox to clean it — not to feed from it. ~ Bulgarian Proverb

There is no such thing as bad food when you are really hungry. ~ Japanese Proverbs

Warm food, warm friendships. ~ Czech Proverb

Flattery is sweet food for those who can swallow it. ~ Danish Proverbs

Words are sweet but they can never replace food. ~ Nigerian Proverb

One father can feed seven children, but seven children cannot feed one father. ~ Cameroonian Proverb

It is up to the people to feed the dogs; it’s up to the Cardias to feed the Turks. ~ Kurdish Proverb

The rich would have to eat money, but luckily the poor provide food. ~ Russian Proverbs

The most dangerous food to eat is a wedding cake. ~ Traditional Proverb

Whoever feeds the wolf in the winter will be eaten by him in the spring. ~ Greek Proverbs

Let us hurry and finish up the food; when visitors arrive, the meal will be over. ~ New Zealander Proverb

He who believes in dreams feeds on wind. ~ Bulgarian Proverb

The earth is God’s bride — she feeds the living and cherishes the dead. ~ Malagasy Proverb

When the sea turned into honey, the poor man lost his spoon. ~ Bulgarian Proverb

The less soup, the more spoons. ~ Malawian Proverb

No one knows as much about the pot as does the spoon. ~ Andes Proverb

If it were ever to rain soup, the poor would only have forks. ~ Brazilian Proverb

Don’t dig your grave with your knife and fork. ~ English Proverb

Do not put your spoon into the pot which does not boil for you. ~ Romanian Proverbs

Better no spoon than no soup. ~ German Proverbs

A spoon does not know the taste of soup, nor a learned fool the taste of wisdom. ~ Welsh Proverb

Quotations about food

There is nothing to which men, while they have food and drink, cannot reconcile themselves. ~ George Santayana

Food–what is chosen from the possibilities available, how it is presented, how it is eaten, with whom and when, and how much time is allotted to cooking and eating it–is one of the means by which a society creates itself and acts out its aims and fantasies. ~ Margaret Visser

Food is our common ground, a universal experience. ~ James Beard

Good food and a warm kitchen are what make a house a home. ~ Rachael Ray

God comes to the hungry in the form of food. ~ Mahatma Gandhi

Food probably has a very great influence on the condition of men. Wine exercises a more visible influence, food does it more slowly but perhaps just as surely. Who knows if a well-prepared soup was not responsible for the pneumatic pump or a poor one for a war? ~ Georg C. Lichtenberg

Make food a very incidental part of your life by filling your life so full of meaningful things that you’ll hardly have time to think about food. ~ Peace Pilgrim

I am not a glutton — I am an explorer of food. ~ Erma Bombeck

More die in the United States of too much food than of too little. ~ John Kenneth

You can’t just eat good food. You’ve got to talk about it too. And you’ve got to talk about it to somebody who understands that kind of food. ~ Kurt Vonnegut

Food … is the topmost taper on the golden candelabrum of existence. ~ Donald Barthelme

The act of putting into your mouth what the earth has grown is perhaps your most direct interaction with the earth. ~ Frances Moore Lappe

Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly. ~ M.F.K. Fisher

There is such a thing as food and such a thing as poison. But the damage done by those who pass off poison as food is far less than that done by those who generation after generation convince people that food is poison. ~ Paul Goodman

Food is an important part of a balanced diet. ~ Fran Lebowitz

Food is “everyday”–it has to be, or we would not survive for long. But food is never just something to eat. It is something to find or hunt or cultivate first of all; for most of human history we have spent a much longer portion of our lives worrying about food, and plotting, working, and fighting to obtain it, than we have in any other pursuit. As soon as we can count on a food supply (and so take food for granted), and not a moment sooner, we start to civilize ourselves. ~ Margaret Visser

We may find in the long run that tinned food is a deadlier weapon than the machine-gun. ~ George Orwell

Never eat more than you can lift. ~ Miss Piggy

The discovery of a new dish does more for human happiness than the discovery of a new star. ~ Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

Food is much better off the hand than the fork. ~ Mario Batali

I will not eat oysters. I want my food dead — not sick, not wounded — dead. ~ Woody Allen

What is food to one, is to others bitter poison. ~ Lucretius

If you’re going to America, bring your own food. ~ Fran Lebowitz

There is no love sincerer than the love of food. ~ George Bernard Shaw

Sadder than destitution, sadder than a beggar is the man who eats alone in public. Nothing more contradicts the laws of man or beast, for animals always do each other the honor of sharing or disputing each other’s food. ~ Jean Baudrillard