20 English Food Idioms That You’ll Want To Taco ‘Bout
Blog
January 13, 2022
By Sarah Angela Almaden
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When it’s raining hard, you often hear the expression “it is raining cats and dogs.” When you’re starving, you can say “I’m so hungry I can eat a horse.” When wishing someone good luck, you hear the saying “break a leg.” These three expressions are what you call idiomatic expressions.
An idiomatic expression is an expression that has a different meaning from the literal phrase. Idiomatic expressions are fun, informal sayings to describe a feeling, a person, or even an event.
These expressions are “blessings in disguise” as they add color to a colorless sentence. Before we “call it a day”, here is a list of 20 food idiomatic expressions!
- 1. As flat as a pancake
- Meaning – something that is very flat
- Sentence – After getting ran over by my neighbor’s truck, the squeaky toy was as flat as a pancake.
- 2. As easy as pie
- Meaning – something that is easily done
- Sentence – “Solving this 20-piece puzzle is as easy as pie.” is what Bill the mailman said.
- 3. Big cheese
- Meaning – most powerful and important person
- Sentence – Fran is now the big cheese of this company.
- 4. Cheap as chips
- Meaning – extremely cheap
- Sentence – These three thrifted books are as cheap as chips.
- 5. Cherry on top
- Meaning – finishing touch of something
- Sentence – The lace detailing on that couture piece is the cherry on top.
- 6. Clam up
- Meaning – to stop talking
- Sentence – Why does Bob clam up as soon as Martha walks in?
- 7. Cool as a cucumber
- Meaning – very calm and relaxed
- Sentence – The students were as cool as a cucumber when Hayao Miyazaki passed by
- 8. Go bananas
- Meaning – to go crazy
- Sentence – My friends are going bananas when they found out Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber visited the restaurant five blocks away.
- 9. Good egg
- Meaning – honest and trustworthy
- Sentence – Elouise always helps Ms. Laurie with her groceries. She is such a good egg.
- 10. Hard nut to crack
- Meaning – a person or a thing that is difficult to understand
- Sentence – The new set of math homework is a hard nut to crack.
- 11. In a pickle
- Meaning – stuck in a difficult situation
- Sentence – With Italy’s eight grandest weddings coming up, the event planners are just realizing that they’re in a pickle.
- 12. In a jam
- Meaning – something in trouble
- Sentence – The tourists are in a jam after finding out their tour guide left them.
- 13. Life is a bowl of cherries
- Meaning – life is full of pleasure
- Sentence – Life is a bowl of cherries for Violet and her family as they just won the bid for a week’s trip to Turkey.
- 14. Like two peas in a pod
- Meaning – two things are very similar
- Sentence – Since birth, Jack and Johnny have been inseparable. They are like two peas in a pod.
- 15. Nutty as a fruitcake
- Meaning – wacky or crazy
- Sentence – You might think Bridget is nutty as a fruitcake but she is actually the sweetest and most generous person in this building.
- 16. Piece of cake
- Meaning – something simple and easy to accomplish
- Sentence – The book club found knitting a sweater to be a piece of cake.
- 17. Sell like hot cakes
- Meaning – something sold quickly and in large quantities
- Sentence – Joey’s custom backpacks are selling like hot cakes at the bookstore.
- 18. Spill the beans
- Meaning – to reveal the a secret
- Sentence – Be careful when Lady Whistledown comes for a visit because she always likes to spill the beans
- 19. Top banana
- Meaning – most important person
- Sentence – Michael Scott thinks he is the top banana of Dunder Mifflin’s Scranton Branch.
- 20. Walk on eggshells
- Meaning – to be extremely careful and cautious with words and actions
- Sentence – I am always walking on eggshells when Nanny McPhee comes in for a visit.