The joy of food doggerel

[mizducky]

I was inspired to start this topic by the Lutefisk Pie topic over in Cooking, where the inherent humor-potential of the main ingredient inspired a couple of posters to offer such bits of folk artistry as this Ode to Lutefisk.

I dunno if I'm just regressing to childhood or what, but this kind of admittedly sophomoric (or younger) humor always gets a grin out of me. Anybody remember, way back in the early years of Prairie Home Companion, a recurring feature called "The Department of Folk Song"? It was always dedicated to this kind of parody song, and a great many of these songs had to do with beloved (or loathed) food products.

Most of us here in the States are probably familiar with the ol' "Beans beans the musical fruit..." and "Beans in my ears" songs. But what other food-oriented doggerel of this sort do you recall learning? Where did you learn it? (School? Summer camp? The military? Somewhere else?) Oh yeah, and I can't imagine this kind of humor isn't an international phenomenon--or is it? I'd love to know, for instance, whether musical fun is made of certain foods in, say, France. Or Japan. Or other places around the world.

I'll start. My personal favorite in this style of humor is a song I learned of through Prairie Home Companion: What a Friend We Have in Cheeses.

[Knicke]

This is one of those songs that requires two groups, singing alternating phrases and standing or sitting according to their turn. A simple but hilarious one, if you sing it pretty up-tempo (and if you're under 10):

Ham and Eggs

It's apparently a Scout song, but I learned it at church camp.

Edited to add this, ahem, gem...which I learned at the same camp...

Bug Juice

Good times.

Edited April 6, 2006 by Knicke (log)

[racheld]

Girl Scout campfire round:

Great Green Gobs of Greasy, Grimy Gopher Guts,

Musculated Monkey Meat........

Please somebody else continue this one, if you dare...I cannot bear writing down the rest.

add grimace and blush smilies; when have I been so embarrassed?

edited because I had blocked out some of the horror, and thus misquoted

Edited April 7, 2006 by racheld (log)

[SuzySushi]

And of course there's always:

"On Top of Spaghetti," with lyrics by folk song balladeer Tom Glazer, sung to the tune of "On Top of Old Smokey." Lyrics

It was a hit song in 1963.

[munchymom]

I can't really call it "food", but I'll finish the version I learned:

Great green gobs of greasy grimy gopher guts

Mutilated monkey meat

Dirty baby birdies' feet

All this stuff is rolling down the dirty street

And I forgot my spoon!

(Use a straw!)

I'll add a ditty I learned at summer camp:

Mushrooms are a vege-table

That you eat when you are able

You will know them when you eat them

You will know them when you eat them

If in Heaven you awaken

Then you'll find you were mistaken

And the mushrooms you have eaten

Weren't the ones you should've et!

Must've been toadstools - tough luck!

[srhcb]

"Mr Green Genes" by Frank Zappa

http://www.lyricsandsongs.com/song/290365.html

Eat your greens

Don't forget your beans & celery

Don't forget to bring

Your fake I.D.

Eat a bunch of these

MAGNIFICIENT

With sauerkraut

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Sauerkraut!

Eat a grape, a fig

A crumpete too ...

You'll pump 'em right through

Doo-wee-ooo

I especially like the next verse where he rhymes

Even eat the box

You bought 'em in

with

You can eat the truck

That brought 'em in

SB (Zappa fan)

Edited April 7, 2006 by srhcb (log)

[mizducky]

"Mr Green Genes" by Frank Zappa

http://www.lyricsandsongs.com/song/290365.html

Eat your greens

Don't forget your beans & celery

Don't forget to bring

Your fake I.D.

Eat a bunch of these

MAGNIFICIENT

With sauerkraut

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Sauerkraut!

Eat a grape, a fig

A crumpete too ...

You'll pump 'em right through

Doo-wee-ooo

I especially like the next verse where he rhymes

Even eat the box

Your bought 'em in

with

You can eat the truck

That brought 'em in

SB (Zappa fan)

←

Yeah, Uncle Frankie did seem to find food endlessly amusing, didn't he? Well, maybe not quite as amusing as the sexual exploits of his touring bands, but still ...

I think my personal favorite Zappa food song (at least this week) is "Muffin Man:" "Arrogantly twisting the sterile canvas snoot of a fully charged icing-anointment utensil, he poots forth a quarter-ounce green rosetta ... "

[mizducky]

Oh, I just remembered another childhood food-related hit:

(to the tune of "The Prettiest Girl I Ever Saw"; in addition to the verse doubling, each line is repeated responsively by a second group of giggling students)

The littlest worm

I ever saw

Was stuck inside

My soda straw

(repeat verse)

He said to me

"Don't take a sip

'Cause if you do

You'll really flip!"

(repeat verse)

I took a sip

And he went down

Right through my pipes

I guess he drowned

(repeat verse)

He was my pal

He was my friend

And now he's gone

And that's the end

(repeat verse)

To be sung at top volume while jumping up and down in the back of the school bus, on the way home from the last day of school before summer vacation.

[onehsancare]

Nobody likes me

Everybody hates me

Think I'll go eat worms!

Big fat juicy ones

Little tiny squirty ones

Watch the little ones squirm!

Bite their heads off

Suck the juice out

Throw the skins away!

Nobody knows what a girl can do with worms three times a day!

[MelissaH]

Fried ham, fried ham

Cheese and bologna!

After the macaroni

We'll have onions,

Pickles, and peppers,

And then we'll have some more

Fried ham fried ham fried ham!

Save some second verse,

_____ talk, much much worse!

MelissaH

[rooftop1000]

Found a peanut, found a peanut, found a peanut last night

last night I found a peanut, found a peatnut last night

It was rotten.......

Ate it anyway......

I forgot the rest

tracey

[Knicke]

rooftop1000 Posted Today, 02:02 PM

  Found a peanut, found a peanut, found a peanut last night

last night I found a peanut, found a peatnut last night

It was rotten.......

Ate it anyway......

I forgot the rest

Apparently, it ends badly and/or circuitously...

[mizducky]

Heh. I just remembered another song my mom taught me when I was a kid:

(Verses sung to the tune of "Turkey in the Straw"; chorus to the tune of "Shave and a haircut." "SHUT UP!!!" bit at the end of the chorus should be yelled at the top of one's lungs, with great glee.)

Oh, I went into a bakery shop to get a bite to eat

'Cause I was so hungry from my head to my feet

So I picks up a doughnut and I wipes off the grease

And I hands the waitress a five-cent piece.

Weeelllllllll ... she looks at the nickel and she looks at me

And she says "Kind sir, can't you plainly see

There's a hole in the nickel and it goes right through."

Says I, "There's a hole in the doughnut too!"

Chorus:

Bump-steady-adam--bump bump!

Shave and a haircut--shampoo!

Hit by an auto--Bellevue!*

Clothes on the washline--dry up!

You said a mouthful--SHUT UP!!!

Oh, I had a little chicken and she wouldn't lay an egg

So I poured hot water up and down her leg**

And the little chicken cried and the little chicken begged

And the little chicken laid a hard-boiled egg

Chorus

*Bellevue, as all New Yorkers already know, is a major hospital in Manhattan

**Not responsible for any animal cruelty implied by this verse

[srhcb]

I'll never forget "One Meat Ball!" from the Captain Kangaroo show.

SB (liked the Captain)(especially Mr Moose)

[Mike Hunt]

Apologies to one and all .................

Bohemian Curry Song

To be sung to the tune of 'Bohemian Rapsody' (Queen!)

Naan-aa, just killed a man

Poppadom against his head

Had lime pickle, now he's dead.

Naan-aa, dinner just begun

But now I'm going to crap it all away.

Naan-aa, ooh-ooh

Didn't mean to make you cry,

Seen nothin' yet just see the loo tomorrow,

Curry on, Curry on, 'cause nothing really madras.

Too late, my dinner's gone

Sends shivers up my spine

Rectum aching all the time.

Goodbye every bhaji, I've got to go

Gotta leave you all behind and use the loo.

Naan-aa, ooh ooh,

This Dopiaza's mild,

I Sometimes wish we'd never come here at all...

******

(Guitar solo)

*****

I see a little chicken tikka on the side,

Rogan Josh, Rogan Josh pass the chutney made of mango.

Vindaloo does nicely

Very very spicey ME!

Biryani (Biryani)

Biryani (Biryani)

Biryani and a naan,

(A vindaloo loo looo...)

I've eaten balti, somebody help me

He's eaten balti, get him to a lavatory

Stand you well back Cause this loo is quarantined.

Here it comes,

There it goes,

technicolor yawn.

I chunder

No!

It's coming up again

(There he goes) I chunder It's coming up again

(There he goes) It's coming up again, (Up again)

Coming up again (up again)

Here it comes again

(No no no no no non o no no No)

On my knees, I'm on my knees, I'm on my knees

Oh there he goes

This vindaloo

Is about to wreck my guts

Poor me... Poor me... Poor me!

*****

(Guitar solo)

*****

So you think you can chunder and still it's alright?

So you want to eat curry and drink beer all night?

Ohh maybe, now you'll puke like a baby,

Just had to come out,

Just had to come right out in here....

******

(Guitar solo)

******

Korma, saag or bhuna,

Balti, naan, bhaji.

Nothing makes a difference

Nothing makes a difference to me

(Anyway, my wind blows.)

[srhcb]

Apologies to one and all .................

Bohemian Curry Song

Nothing makes a difference

Nothing makes a difference to me

←

No apologies needed.

I'm almost sure there's a Serbian version.

SB (Eastern European Existentialist)

[mizducky]

Bohemian Curry Song

. . . .

Nothing makes a difference

Nothing makes a difference to me

(Anyway, my wind blows.)

←

oh. my. god. That's ... words fail me.

[racheld]

I came on to post a couple of verses also set to "Turkey In the Straw," but things here are best left just as they are. Just for today. Neither Mozart nor Eminem could follow that at this moment.

(wandering off to replay BoRap, just for reassurance)