Food Words for Children

[Smithy]

At some point in our childhoods, my little brother got into teasingly calling me "Ellen Ellen Watermelon." I hated it.

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That reminds me, my friends called their child "Anna Banana" when she was a baby and toddler. At some point before she started Kindergarten, they realized she would not want that name when she was growing up, so the pet name was shortened to Anna B. Has a nice ring, doesn't it?

[banco]

My wife is German and we speak German at home. Our four-year-old son has very fair skin. Especially when he was younger I would call his legs "Würschtelbeine," which is south German dialect for "little sausage legs." They remind me of plump Bavarian white sausages. Of course, the notion of loving our kids so much that we want to "gobble them up" is a bit sinsiter and has been the basis of all kinds of childrens' stories (especialy in German-speaking Europe).

[JPW]

The more formal name for our Peanut is "the legume" (coined by Hillvalley).

Someone once called her "Chicken Wing" because he said her tiny little legs looked like chicken wings.

[petite tête de chou]

I had such a round face when I was a baby that my grandfather called me his little cabbage head. My parents and childhood friends still call me chou...short for petite tete de chou.

[Potter]

I call my son, Butter Biscuit, Sugar Bun and Honey Bun.

My sister refers to her kids as meatballs or manigot (weird italian pronunciation for manicotti).

Sometimes, I'll call an especially chubby baby a "porkchop"

[Curlz]

Duh. How could I forget? My dad has called me "Sugar" my whole life! Guess I was thinking of LITTLE kids based on the topic title.

[Luckylies]

Currently Emma is "Pumpkin Pie" and Ian is either "Chunky Monkey" or "Chunk-style".

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weird, my name is Emma, and my boyfriend Ian.

Perhaps Ian's and Emma's are just meant to be.

I call kids peanuts, muffins, chickpeas, brats...

[bavila]

Well, my daughter's name is a food -- Madeleine. We served madeleines at her baptism celebration.

I also at various times have called her:

sweetpea

sugar or sugar plum

Madeleine sandwich (as in she's so cute and yummy I could have a...)

bean (short for Mexican jumping bean when she was in utero)

A Mexican friend calls her kids piglets in Spanish -- can't find the actual word right now.

[markovitch]

my neice is 'pie' or π....

all started when my brother screwed up the 'bun in the oven' and said 'pie in the oven'

stuck.

[khm99]

My husband and I referred to our then in-utero child as the "niblet".

[ScorchedPalate]

No kids here either, but...

I have a co-worker who called her baby Tofu Avocado when she was in utero.

My younger dog, Bella, looks like a piglet and as a result is often called Hammie or Smith (for Smithfield Ham). Our ex-chef friend Mark calls her Porcellina (suckling pig). She even makes little pig-gruntie noises...

[mizducky]

Hey, if we're gonna branch out into non-human "offspring" ...

A roommate of mine when we were both in our twenties had a huge cat named Catsup - usually deliberately mispronounced as "Cat-soup." Catsup bore such a strong resemblance to the cats drawn by B. Kliban that I soon started calling him Meatloaf a la the Kliban definition of "cat" ("one hell of a nice animal, frequently mistaken for a meatloaf"), and the alternate name stuck.

Another cat in my life I named Orange Julius because of his markings: he was a gorgeous little orange-tabby-point Siamese, and his non-point body fur was the most amazing shade of pale orange. Only kind of food-related: Orange Julius also had a nickname bestowed on him by my brother (he has a knack for it)--Agent Orange, on account of this cat's propensity for defoliating all my mom's houseplants.

Oh, and another cat of mine was named Jimmy Dean, the Rebel Without A Clue--but that was equal parts reference to the actor and the sausage-maker.

[Maison Rustique]

How could I forget! I also refer to chitlins as crumb-crunchers.

[Pan]

Duh.  How could I forget?  My dad has called me "Sugar" my whole life![...]

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Yeah, my fictive grandmother, Mrs. Carr, a black lady from the South, always called me "sugar." Of course, I think she called a lot of people "sugar." She was a really wonderful, sweet lady.

Milagai, pamplemousse as far as I know is simply grapefruit, not any particular variety.

[greenwich st]

Cupcake. My husband (French) called our newborn "Crevette" and I still call her shrimpy sometimes.

[Mooshmouse]

And then there's the expression "yard eggs" which usually refers to children under one year of age.

[EricaL]

We've referred to my friend's daughter as "The Bean" since she was still in the belly...not even sure why, but I'll still ask "How's the Bean?" 

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I have called my niece Caroline 'bean' ever since she was born!

Erica

[FabulousFoodBabe]

I called my sons "Sprouts" until they were more the size of the Green Giant.

[lamb]

My dad, many many years ago, called me Chicken Licken. Don't know why, and I really didn't like it that much. I'd give a gazillion dollars to be able to hear him call me that again.

My daughter, Amanda, was conceived after a festive night - drinking many Margaritas

Hubby and I were tempted to name her that, but it really didn't go with our last name. While she was learning spanish in school as her second language requirement, her teacher assigned each student a spanish name. When she came home and said her teacher was calling her Margherita, we cracked up. Someday I'll tell her why.

[laniloa]

For a brief period I was referred to as gumdrop for no apparent reason. Perhaps why the nickname didn't stick.

I work in the fish world and for a while we referred to a friend's as-yet-unborn child by various fish life stages. When the kid was born, it became pollock which has stuck.

[lexy]

my kindergarten teacher called us all her "petits chou-chous" … I guess 'cabbage' is a pretty common french pet name for kids; sort of strange once you think about it

[daniellewiley]

We called my oldest son "Goober" until he got to be taller than us. We have stopped now.

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That's what we call our 3 year old daughter. She dishes it right back though. I love it when she turns to my husband and says, "You silly goober!!"

She also calls him butterfingers whenever he (frequently) drops something.

Perhaps we need a new thread of food names that our children use for us!

Edited to add: And my dad always called me Cookie. Now, it's been shortened to Cook. He sends me notes addressed to Cook, and when he calls, he always says, "Hey Cook..."

Edited March 24, 2005 by daniellewiley (log)

[Viola da gamba]

I called my sons "Sprouts" until they were more the size of the Green Giant.

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Oh - hey - I'd forgotten that one (I try not to think of sprouts as food). I still get that one from my Dad.

[lorilei1170]

My little sister is affectionately known as "chicken noodle melon head"

[suzilightning]

from the time our neighbor alexandra was about 2 1/2 she named herself pie and that is what we call her.