I know, I used a big word in the title. Let me explain: “Anthropomorphizing” means to talk about a thing as if it is human. Like the objects in this image.
Why do food writers do it? Mostly, they humanize inanimate objects, almost always fruits and vegetables. They don’t seem to write this way about meat and seafood, although companies do. Charlie Tuna is still around. That’s even more creepy, since a fish used to be alive in a way that’s more obvious to us than produce.
Maybe this issue will make more sense if you read some writing that annoys me.
Here are 4 examples of anthropomorphizing food. See if you find them disturbing:
- Bon Appetit magazine: “Swaddle your greens gently but firmly; it’s what they like.” How does the writer know that greens like to be swaddled? Did they tell her? This would be a first. And scary. Also greens are not babies, if that’s not obvious.
- Ruth Reichl: “… an absolutely perfect crust filled with fruit that actually sings to you.” Nope. The fruit can’t “actually” do that. It’s dead. Fruit doesn’t have a mouth, face, or lungs either. Gross. (And don’t get me started on using the word “perfect.”)
- From a cookbook that will stay anonymous, because I know and like the writer: “Avocado plays well with…” Slices of avocado, or even a whole avocado, cannot play with anyone or anything. They’re inanimate.
- San Francisco Chronicle: “It’s clever to put the onions in the bun and to shred the cool crunchy ingredients so they equally inform each bite.” Ingredients cannot inform you. They can’t talk.
I have written a sentence like the one in Number 4 before. I admit that I’ve read sentences like that and copied them. It’s normal to do that as a writer because, when you’re learning, you think that’s how you’re supposed to write. But sometimes you’re copying bad writing, even if you see it elsewhere and try to rationalize that it’s good.
Sorry to talk about death and all. It’s not my usual topic. But really, why do some food writers feel they have to make our food seem human? That’s not an appetizing idea at all.
Hi Dianne — I love your blog and find the posts thought-provoking and instructive. But, I disagree on this one. Writing shouldn’t be sloppy, but as an editor (and writer myself) I don’t mind writers getting a little playful. No, greens aren’t literally being swaddled, and avocados aren’t actually playing with another ingredient. But, both images make me smile, and more importantly, give me direction when I’m cooking or creating a meal.
I agree that there is a time and a place for anthropomorphizing food, but, especially in voice-y writing, I often find it charming.
Hey Jenna, that’s fine if you find this kind of writing charming. We can agree to disagree. I find it creepy. It’s probably because I often take things too literally.
And thanks for the kind words. I actually prefer that you don’t love all my posts — that way I know you’re really reading them.
I once had a very abusive Romaine leaf bullying the rest of the salad, finally the anchovies and garlic got together and voted to make the Parmigiano their spokesman. He said, hey Mr. Romaine, who do yo think you are, Caesar?
Great article Dianne Jacob!!
Hah! I can count on you to see the humor in things, John. I must admit, this post was fun to write. And the image is pretty cute too. Maybe I’m learning from you.
Possibly the best comment ever posted on a blog post! Highly entertaining! Thank you!!
Dianne,
I enjoy reading your posts and have learned a lot from you. I have only one suggestion. Could you please change the color of your font to black? I have a difficult time reading your posts because the contrast between the font and background is so minimal.
Thanks!
Margie
I too would like a darker font Margie. I want all the websites to have a dark black font.
Yes I will work on that. Someone else complained about the light color but I didn’t know how to change it! Thanks Margie.
I’ve written that ‘risotto likes company’ as it is made.
I don’t know whether that’d be classed as too anthro… 🙂
I’m afraid it does fall into the category, Nicola. Risotto can’t “like” anything.
I don’t like humanized food writing either. Although, my sausage links do squeal at me from a sizzling hot pan.
Oh gosh that is gruesome. I wouldn’t be able to eat them when they’re alive like that.
Hi Dianne, up until the end of this post I thought it was a joke and you were kidding.
But you are not, and I’m not sure I am getting the point of it. All the examples you give are just metaphors; I’ve seen them used many times in other contexts as well (colors often “sing” and furniture can “play together”, to name but a few). How do you feel about it? Is it just an issue when food writing is involved or it gets on your nerves no matter what?
(Yet, too much of a good thing is still a bad thing, of course: and if I should come upon this kind of writing too often, I might get annoyed too)
I had the same thought. How is anthropomorphizing different from using a metaphor?
I’m not sure if they are metaphors. The issue to me is: Use a different one!
Nope, I’m not kidding. The problem is that I am a literal person and this kind of writing really creeps me out.
It doesn’t get on my nerves as much when it is not food writing. There’s something about thinking that the thing I’m eating is still alive, even when I’m just imaginging it by reading.
“I do love strips of crunchy heritage carrots swimming in unison with plantains in my peppersoup. They make the perfect marriage. ”
I couldn’t resist Dianne! What a fun post! Lerato from London.
Letaro, yes this is another good example. Thanks for providing it!
Dianne,
Among the anthropomorphizing offenders — Julia Child. In a show with Jacques Pepin, she prepared a chicken for roasting by massaging it with butter, asserting in that trilling voice, that “the bird likes it.” Mmmn, kinda doubt it.
That said, a Malaysian cook once told me her soup should simmer “until the ingredients are happy together.” I knew exactly what she meant and was charmed, besides.
Yep. Kinda doubt it too, that the bird enjoyed being dead and massaged. Maybe it made her feel better about eating it?
I do think that is a charming expression. I just don’t want to imagine it.
I quite agree. Hopefully it is just a fad that will die away (ha, ha). Perhaps Nigel Slater helped start this in his BBC series years ago by enthusing how a certain ingredient would make the dish ‘sing’ (he also used ‘zing’ a lot, but that tends to be added).
I get my sensitivity to this from an earlier career in art conservation, where people often say that the objects is ‘suffering’ from damage, or that the object must be able to ‘breathe’ (no doubt with all those teeny weeny lungs), when they mean air exchange must be maintained.
I also have more of a problem with those jolly images of laughing pigs, cows, etc, on food packaging and signs in shops. See how they just love to be butchered and eaten! Creepy and delusional.
Ah, but now this is now simply presenting an alternative fact.
Good list here of all kinds of creepy things, Jennifer. It’s just human nature to humanize, I guess. It’s one thing to do it in speech though, and another thing to write it. If I had to pick the worst offenders, it would be the companies who promote the jolly images of farm animals who look forward to being eaten. Exactly.
Aha!
Yes, as pertains to our conversation last night. But your sausage poem wasn’t creepy at all. I didn’t see it the same way.
Brava, Dianne.
Thank you Paula. Great to hear from you and I hope you are well.
I agree with you Dianne. I especially despise the phrase, “plays well with,” when writing about food. Thanks for this post.
Yes we do see that one a lot. And as I mentioned, we start using terms ourselves sometimes, because they are in our consciousness. I’m guilty of that too.
I don’t see “plays well” as being an example of anthropomorphizing, unless you’re inferring a different definition of the word. It doesn’t mean they “play” like children on a playground. It’s no different from saying they work together–which doesn’t mean they have adjoining cubicles in an office.
Ha! Good one. On the other hand, you might interpret it one way, while your reader might interpret it another.
Hi Dianne.
I read all your posts and find them informative as they help an amatuer writer like myself to avoid making mistakes.
However, I have to disagree with you this time. I think cookbook writing like this is fun and gives me a glimpse into the writer’s personality. It creates a connection to the writer as well. I always smile to when reading recipes like this.
I suspect I have sinned on this one but I agree it is better to use accurate language (especially in recipes) and save the flights of fancy for … love letters?? Almost Valentine’s Day!
Hi Dianne, I am far less offended by anthropomorphizing than I am by writers and bloggers who refer to certain foods as being “like crack”. Now there’s some terminology, I would like to see an end to.
Oh oh. I have called adjectives the “crack” of food writing. Is that wrong too?
Sometimes the writing can get *cutesy* which I don’t like, but in most “anthropomorphizing” examples the descriptions just give me a both a technical sense of what the author means and also the feeling or imagination the author brings to the cooking. They’re doing double work, which seems like a good thing, not sloppy word use at all.
Personally, I don’t want to imagine that the thing I am about to eat is capable of thinking and performing acts such as singing. But hey, if it works for you, great. I believe editors get rid of this kind of writing whenever they can, so that we see less of it. For that I am grateful.
Your first three examples are matters of stylistic preference; I can understand why they would be annoying, if used to excess. But in your fourth example, the word “inform” is used not metaphorically but in one of its literal, dictionary senses: “to give evident substance, character, or distinction to; pervade or permeate with manifest effect.” The cool, crunchy ingredients permeate each bite, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
I guess technically it’s correct, Susan, but I still don’t like it. How can a dead thing give something distinction? How can it “give” anything? That’s what gets me, but hey, sometimes people tell me I’m too literal.
It’s interesting that in historical recipe writing anthropomorphizing food was quit normal. Not in the way you describe but they would say things like: “baste him with the sauce” instead of “baste it with the sauce” when referring to lets say a capon or something. Scarier it become when they say “take the skin of him”, “roast him” and “put a pudding in his belly”.
Aww. And notice how the references are all male.
The use of “his” for “its” was, oddly enough, grammatically correct in all dialects of English before the 16th century, and remained in some dialects until well into the 19th century. In some cases writers who used “his” instead of “its” would use “he” instead of “it” (or, if you go far back enough, “hit”) for consistency.
In some dialects “its” was considered as ungrammatical as “ain’t” today, or perhaps “he seen”, until Austen’s day.
Which brings up a point: have you ever looked into how differences in word usage, food availability, and cooking styles affect recipe writing even within the developed English-speaking world? I’m thinking of things like recipes that call for “500 g cubed frozen neeps, thawed” (WTF Brits) or “1/2 stick butter” (WTF Americans) or “2 cups less 1 tbsp icing sugar” (WTF Canadians) or the screeching assertions that shepherd’s pie must always contain lamb (WTF Brits, again).
Yes, I have covered some of these things in my book and on this blog, Charlene. Definitely 1/2 stick butter does not translate. When a big British book comes out in the US, the publisher hires an editor to translate what Americans wouldn’t understand, such as neeps and icing sugar.
While I generally agree that too much of anything in writing is not good, including anthropomorphization, sometimes it just WORKS. And when it does, it can convey exactly the information you want better than anything. When Fergus Henderson called for “6 tomatoes, the happiest you can find (it is possible to find tomatoes on the vine)” in a recipe in “Nose to Tail Eating” that I Americanized into “The Whole Beast,” there was no way I would have queried what he meant, much less changed it! Of course I didn’t see tomatoes giggling and bouncing around with each other–but I knew exactly what they should be like. To this day, “find the happiest [whatever]” is code in our house for the best version of any product, living or dead!
It is kind of cute. But to be honest, I don’t know why the tomatoes would be happy. It’s more about humans being happy to find them.
And if I might give an example of one of (to me) the worst offenders: Ligaya Mishan, who writes about “ethnic” restaurants in the NY Times in the Hungry City column. She is an MFA in poetry, and unfortunately uses that skill set in her reviews. A few examples, discussing the dishes at a Filipino restaurant:
“…callos, chickpeas and ham interleaved with tripe brought to a boil three times, until it gives up the fight” NO, for several reasons: the fight was lost long ago by the ham and tripe (they’re dead) and it is unclear which item is giving up the fight, anyway–the whole dish (callos), the ham, or just the tripe?
“…liempo, pork belly best baptized in the accompanying suka of cane vinegar armed with chile.” No: while the pork belly is definitely not Jewish or Muslim, it can’t want to be Christian, either.
“In a recent meal, the flounder came prettily swaddled in banana leaves but emerged spongy. ” Dianne already covered this swaddling business. And the flounder has little hope of emerging on its own.
I will point out that judging by the comments, this column receives, there are readers who eat this stuff up.
Ooh. I am a big fan of her writing. Yeah, I agree with the first example.
In the second, baptized means sprinkled with water, but it can’t be separated from the fact that it occurs within a baptism. So while it’s imaginative I’d have to agree, Suzanne. Re No. 3, I don’t mind it, because the chef swaddled it. In my example, the greens “liked” being swaddled.
Sure, people like the idea of humanizing food — for 2 reasons, I think: it makes us feel better about killing things, and it’s cute. But I’m sticking to my guns: it’s also creepy.
Another thought-provoking post, Dianne. Here’s a theory: Perhaps we spend so much time in our kitchens with just our ingredients and cooking tools for company, they begin to feel like friends and so we write about them in this way. I think writers should use caution with this kind of language, but I do like a bit of anthropomorphizing myself.
You mean we should get out more and that would solve it? Hah! You crack me up, Katie.