Quotations about Vegetables and Greens
Welcome to my page of quotes about veggies and leafy greens. Here's to fresh vegetable gardens and good health!
—tg
SEE ALSO:
GARDENS,
SALADS,
FRUIT,
SPRING,
SUMMER,
AUTUMN,
BEES,
SUN,
HEALTH,
GREEN,
NATURE,
ENVIRONMENT,
COOKING,
EATING,
VEGETARIANISM
The greatest delight which the fields and woods minister is the suggestion of an occult relation between man and the vegetable. I am not alone and unacknowledged. They nod to me, and I to them. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Nature"
A great deal has been written and said and sung in praise of green trees. And yet there are comparatively few green trees that are good to eat. Asparagus is probably the best of them, though celery is by no means to be despised. ~Ambrose Bierce
Hence various trees their various fruits produce,
Some for delightful taste, and some for use.
Hence sprouting plants enrich the plain and wood,
For physic some, and some design'd for food.
~Richard Blackmore, "Wisdom of God in the Vegetable Creation," 1712
Wouldn' it be awful if spinach hain't really healthful after all th' trouble it takes t' git th' sand out of it? ~Kin Hubbard
Sauerkraut may be reckoned among the wholesomest foods. ~Sebastian Kneipp, Thus Shalt Thou Live: Hints and Advice for the Healthy and the Sick on a Simple and Rational Mode of Life and a Natural Method of Cure, 1889, translated from the 19th German edition
For happy health, fuel yourself with dreams and greens. ~Terri Guillemets
I don't know if you know much about mushrooms, but they're easy to raise... All you need is a place that's kind of damp and dark, like under a car or a wagon or in a cellar that hasn't got any heat. It's a lot of fun raising them. Maybe that's why they call them fungi. Anyway, Minerva Skybrow put the fun in fungi for us all right... Only you've got to be careful, because if you eat the wrong kind of mushroom, the first thing you know some fine day you'll wake up and find yourself dead. ~Percy Keese Fitzhugh, Roy Blakeley: Lost, Strayed or Stolen, 1921
The Mushroom is the Elf of Plants –
At Evening, it is not
At Morning, in a Truffled Hut
It stop upon a Spot...
~Emily Dickinson, c.1874
All green vegetables are blood purifiers; they help to dissolve other food in the stomach and assist digestion. ~Marion Harris Neil, "The Proper Way to Cook Summer Vegetables," 1908
Fruits and vegetables are blood purifiers, appetizers, tonics; hence, save doctor's bills.~G. F. S., 1919
Keep as near as ever you can to the first sources of supply — fruits and vegetables. ~Benjamin Ward Richardson (1828–1896)
Lettuce is like conversation: it must be fresh and crisp, so sparkling that you scarcely notice the bitter in it. ~Charles Dudley Warner, My Summer in a Garden, 1870
As one who achieved the symmetry of a Humphrey Bogart and the grace of a jaguar purely on pastry, I have no truck with lettuce, cabbage and similar fronds. Any dietitian will tell you that a running foot of apple strudel contains four times the vitamins of a bushel of beans. In my own case, at least, greens are synonymous with poison. Every time I crunch a stalk of celery, there is a whirring crash, a shriek of tortured hemoglobin, and my metabolism goes to the boneyard. Yet come the middle of April, the family invariably gets an urge to see the old man beating his brains out in the garden patch. ~S. J. Perelman, Acres and Pains, 1943
To my gardener friend, in your
Linnet-haunted garden-ground,
Let the esculents abound.
Let first the onion flourish there,
Rose among roots, the maiden-fair,
Wine-scented and poetic soul
Of the capacious salad bowl...
Mountaineer thyme, wading cress,
Crisp and ruddy radish, speary heads
Of artichoke, beans of savoury green...
These tend, I prithee, for me...
And I, being provided thus,
Shall, with superb asparagus,
A book, a taper, and a cup
Of country wine, divinely sup.
~Robert Louis Stevenson, "To a Gardener" [altered—tg]
And why, indeed, did God leave all his vegetables raw? Pish! ~Edward Payson Powell (1833–1915), "An Old-Time Thanksgiving," 1904
...persons living very entirely on vegetables are seldom of a plump and succulent habit. ~William Cullen, M.D.
Our bodies run on the fresh green fuel of the land. ~Terri Guillemets, "Fresh & green," 2011
Ripe 'sparagrass,
Fit for lad or lass,
To make their water pass:
O, 'tis pretty picking
With a tender chicken!
~Jonathan Swift, "Asparagus"
Tuck a bit of green into every dinner. Even a platter of beans is in this way transformed into a thing of beauty. Of variety in garnishing there need be no lack with the garden, wayside, and woods abounding in beautiful leaves, vines, and flowers. There are foliage plant, geranium, and autumn leaves, ferns in variety, with lettuce, endive, spinach, parsley, chervil, carrot tops, and sprays of maidenhair fern. The variegated variety of beet leaves, as also the bright blossoms of nasturtiums make a brilliant garnish. ~Evora Bucknum Perkins, The Laurel Health Cookery, 1911[a little altered —tg]
The yellow orchid why discuss,
When you can eat asparagus!
What stained-glass window could repeat
The red-veined leafage of the beet?
What delicately mottled green
Is in the humble, honest bean,
And what a balm for sin and grief
The crisp and curly lettuce leaf!...
An onion, if you hold your nose,
Is marvellous as any rose!
~Christopher Morley, "My Favorite Flowers"
Vegetables and fruits often take the place of medicines in curing disease, and as they are natural cures, their use is favored. ~Professor Fourmen, "Diet Cures and Anti-Drug Remedies," Physical Health Culture: A Popular Manual of Bodily Exercises and Home Gymnastics for Men and Women, 1901
[Celery] is as fresh and clean as a rainy day after a spell of heat. It crackles pleasantly in the mouth.... it should be eaten alone, for it is the only food which one really wants to hear oneself eat. ~A. A. Milne (1882–1956), "A Word for Autumn," Not That It Matters
When forced to wait and wait for luncheon,
A stalk or two will serve to munch on,
A use which would, indeed, be laudable,
If only it weren't quite so audible.
~Richard Armour, "Celery," in What Cheer: An Anthology of American and British Humorous and Witty Verse, Gathered, Sifted, and Salted, with an Introduction by David McCord, 1945
Celery, raw,
Develops the jaw,
But celery, stewed,
Is more quietly chewed.
~Ogden Nash (1902–1971), "Celery"
Mmm. Oh, deep-tasting truffle, so earthy — like you are eating autumn. ~The Great, "Parachute," 2020, Hulu, written by Tony McNamara, Vanessa Alexander, and Gretel Vella, based on the 2008 play by Tony McNamara[S1, E6, Peter III]
good health, yes, is partly genes
really though it's more about greens
and other types of healthful things
~Terri Guillemets
Every cloud has a silver lining and every plate of vegetable soup is filled with vegetables. ~W. C. Fields, 1934
Norm: Oh my God, what are these?
Paul: They appear to be orange and green sticks.
Cliff: Oh, I know what they are. You know when you go in a restaurant and you order a nice, big, thick, juicy steak, and they put this other stuff on the plate that you shove aside?
Paul: Oh, you mean vegetables.
Norm: These can't be vegetables, there's no batter.
~Cheers, "Rat Girl," 1991, written by Ken Levine and David Isaacs[S9, E25]
Greens feed our souls, refresh our minds, and nourish our grateful bodies. ~Terri Guillemets, "Ascending," 2007
If you don't know what's meant by God, watch a forsythia branch or a lettuce leaf sprout. ~Martin H. Fischer (1879–1962)
An onion can make people cry, but there has never been a vegetable invented to make them laugh. ~Author unknown, May Irwin's favorite quotation, Saturday Evening Post, 1931, as quoted by Burton Stevenson
Training is everything. The peach was once a bitter almond; cauliflower is nothing but Cabbage with a College Education. ~Mark Twain
Apelles gave us supper as if he had butchered a garden, thinking he was feeding sheep and not friends. There were radishes, chicory, fenugreek, lettuces, leeks, onions, basil, mint, rue, and asparagus. I was afraid that after all these things he would serve me with hay, so when I had eaten some half-soaked lupins I went off. ~Ammianus (2nd century A.D.), in The Greek Anthology, Volume IV, "Book XI: The Convivial and Satirical Epigrams," epigram 413, translated by W.R. Paton, 1918
Lettuce, greens and celery, though much eaten, are worse than cabbage, being equally indigestible without the addition of condiments. Besides, the lettuce contains narcotic properties. It is said of Galen, that he used to obtain from a head of it, eaten on going to bed, all the good effects of a dose of opium. ~William Andrus Alcott, The Young House-keeper: or, Thoughts on Food and Cookery, 1838
A fruit is a vegetable with looks and money. Plus, if you let fruit rot, it turns into wine, something Brussels sprouts never do. ~P. J. O'Rourke, The Bachelor Home Companion, 1987
Green tastes like life, feels like energy, looks like peacefulness, smells like earth's love, sounds like vibrant health (your body listens well). Eat your greens, go wild for greens, play in green, weave green into your colorful daily existence! ~Terri Guillemets, "Go wild for greens," 2008
Though pretty things, they like as not
Are either pithy or too hot,
Nor do you know, till you have bitten,
If you've got a tiger or a kitten.
~Richard Armour, "Radishes," in What Cheer: An Anthology of American and British Humorous and Witty Verse, Gathered, Sifted, and Salted, with an Introduction by David McCord, 1945
The roots most used as table vegetables are turnips, carrots, parsnips, beets, radishes and salsify. The onion is the bulb most generally used as a vegetable and a flavorer. Fruits used as vegetables include eggplant, cucumber, peppers, okra, tomatoes, squash and pumpkin, among others. ~Marion Harris Neil, "The Proper Way to Cook Summer Vegetables," 1908
Sea vegetables are the ocean's mineral and vitamin bank... ~Kristina Turner, The Self-Healing Cookbook, 2002, originally published 1987, kristinaturner.com
If organic is the natural way, shouldn't organic produce just be called "produce" and make the pesticide-laden stuff take the burden of an adjective? ~Terri Guillemets, "Soiled," 2003
According to the latest authorities spring fever, the cause of so much loss of energy, can be prevented by homemakers if they will feed their families in the winter season with plenty of green vegetables. ~Richard Gay Neville, M.D., "Spring Fever," The Forecast, 1921
Life expectancy would grow by leaps and bounds if green vegetables smelled as good as bacon. ~Doug Larson, 1989
A great deal has been written and said and sung in praise of green trees. And yet there are comparatively few green trees that are good to eat. Asparagus is probably the best of them, though celery is by no means to be despised. ~Ambrose Bierce
Hence various trees their various fruits produce,
Some for delightful taste, and some for use.
Hence sprouting plants enrich the plain and wood,
For physic some, and some design'd for food.
~Richard Blackmore, "Wisdom of God in the Vegetable Creation," 1712
Wouldn' it be awful if spinach hain't really healthful after all th' trouble it takes t' git th' sand out of it? ~Kin Hubbard
Sauerkraut may be reckoned among the wholesomest foods. ~Sebastian Kneipp, Thus Shalt Thou Live: Hints and Advice for the Healthy and the Sick on a Simple and Rational Mode of Life and a Natural Method of Cure, 1889, translated from the 19th German edition
For happy health, fuel yourself with dreams and greens. ~Terri Guillemets
I don't know if you know much about mushrooms, but they're easy to raise... All you need is a place that's kind of damp and dark, like under a car or a wagon or in a cellar that hasn't got any heat. It's a lot of fun raising them. Maybe that's why they call them fungi. Anyway, Minerva Skybrow put the fun in fungi for us all right... Only you've got to be careful, because if you eat the wrong kind of mushroom, the first thing you know some fine day you'll wake up and find yourself dead. ~Percy Keese Fitzhugh, Roy Blakeley: Lost, Strayed or Stolen, 1921
The Mushroom is the Elf of Plants –
At Evening, it is not
At Morning, in a Truffled Hut
It stop upon a Spot...
~Emily Dickinson, c.1874
All green vegetables are blood purifiers; they help to dissolve other food in the stomach and assist digestion. ~Marion Harris Neil, "The Proper Way to Cook Summer Vegetables," 1908
Fruits and vegetables are blood purifiers, appetizers, tonics; hence, save doctor's bills.
Keep as near as ever you can to the first sources of supply — fruits and vegetables. ~Benjamin Ward Richardson (1828–1896)
Lettuce is like conversation: it must be fresh and crisp, so sparkling that you scarcely notice the bitter in it. ~Charles Dudley Warner, My Summer in a Garden, 1870
As one who achieved the symmetry of a Humphrey Bogart and the grace of a jaguar purely on pastry, I have no truck with lettuce, cabbage and similar fronds. Any dietitian will tell you that a running foot of apple strudel contains four times the vitamins of a bushel of beans. In my own case, at least, greens are synonymous with poison. Every time I crunch a stalk of celery, there is a whirring crash, a shriek of tortured hemoglobin, and my metabolism goes to the boneyard. Yet come the middle of April, the family invariably gets an urge to see the old man beating his brains out in the garden patch. ~S. J. Perelman, Acres and Pains, 1943
To my gardener friend, in your
Linnet-haunted garden-ground,
Let the esculents abound.
Let first the onion flourish there,
Rose among roots, the maiden-fair,
Wine-scented and poetic soul
Of the capacious salad bowl...
Mountaineer thyme, wading cress,
Crisp and ruddy radish, speary heads
Of artichoke, beans of savoury green...
These tend, I prithee, for me...
And I, being provided thus,
Shall, with superb asparagus,
A book, a taper, and a cup
Of country wine, divinely sup.
~Robert Louis Stevenson, "To a Gardener" [altered
And why, indeed, did God leave all his vegetables raw? Pish! ~Edward Payson Powell (1833–1915), "An Old-Time Thanksgiving," 1904
...persons living very entirely on vegetables are seldom of a plump and succulent habit. ~William Cullen, M.D.
Our bodies run on the fresh green fuel of the land. ~Terri Guillemets, "Fresh & green," 2011
Ripe 'sparagrass,
Fit for lad or lass,
To make their water pass:
O, 'tis pretty picking
With a tender chicken!
~Jonathan Swift, "Asparagus"
Tuck a bit of green into every dinner. Even a platter of beans is in this way transformed into a thing of beauty. Of variety in garnishing there need be no lack with the garden, wayside, and woods abounding in beautiful leaves, vines, and flowers. There are foliage plant, geranium, and autumn leaves, ferns in variety, with lettuce, endive, spinach, parsley, chervil, carrot tops, and sprays of maidenhair fern. The variegated variety of beet leaves, as also the bright blossoms of nasturtiums make a brilliant garnish. ~Evora Bucknum Perkins, The Laurel Health Cookery, 1911
The yellow orchid why discuss,
When you can eat asparagus!
What stained-glass window could repeat
The red-veined leafage of the beet?
What delicately mottled green
Is in the humble, honest bean,
And what a balm for sin and grief
The crisp and curly lettuce leaf!...
An onion, if you hold your nose,
Is marvellous as any rose!
~Christopher Morley, "My Favorite Flowers"
Vegetables and fruits often take the place of medicines in curing disease, and as they are natural cures, their use is favored. ~Professor Fourmen, "Diet Cures and Anti-Drug Remedies," Physical Health Culture: A Popular Manual of Bodily Exercises and Home Gymnastics for Men and Women, 1901
[Celery] is as fresh and clean as a rainy day after a spell of heat. It crackles pleasantly in the mouth.... it should be eaten alone, for it is the only food which one really wants to hear oneself eat. ~A. A. Milne (1882–1956), "A Word for Autumn," Not That It Matters
When forced to wait and wait for luncheon,
A stalk or two will serve to munch on,
A use which would, indeed, be laudable,
If only it weren't quite so audible.
~Richard Armour, "Celery," in What Cheer: An Anthology of American and British Humorous and Witty Verse, Gathered, Sifted, and Salted, with an Introduction by David McCord, 1945
Celery, raw,
Develops the jaw,
But celery, stewed,
Is more quietly chewed.
~Ogden Nash (1902–1971), "Celery"
Mmm. Oh, deep-tasting truffle, so earthy — like you are eating autumn. ~The Great, "Parachute," 2020, Hulu, written by Tony McNamara, Vanessa Alexander, and Gretel Vella, based on the 2008 play by Tony McNamara
good health, yes, is partly genes
really though it's more about greens
and other types of healthful things
~Terri Guillemets
Every cloud has a silver lining and every plate of vegetable soup is filled with vegetables. ~W. C. Fields, 1934
Norm: Oh my God, what are these?
Paul: They appear to be orange and green sticks.
Cliff: Oh, I know what they are. You know when you go in a restaurant and you order a nice, big, thick, juicy steak, and they put this other stuff on the plate that you shove aside?
Paul: Oh, you mean vegetables.
Norm: These can't be vegetables, there's no batter.
~Cheers, "Rat Girl," 1991, written by Ken Levine and David Isaacs
Greens feed our souls, refresh our minds, and nourish our grateful bodies. ~Terri Guillemets, "Ascending," 2007
If you don't know what's meant by God, watch a forsythia branch or a lettuce leaf sprout. ~Martin H. Fischer (1879–1962)
An onion can make people cry, but there has never been a vegetable invented to make them laugh. ~Author unknown, May Irwin's favorite quotation, Saturday Evening Post, 1931, as quoted by Burton Stevenson
Training is everything. The peach was once a bitter almond; cauliflower is nothing but Cabbage with a College Education. ~Mark Twain
Apelles gave us supper as if he had butchered a garden, thinking he was feeding sheep and not friends. There were radishes, chicory, fenugreek, lettuces, leeks, onions, basil, mint, rue, and asparagus. I was afraid that after all these things he would serve me with hay, so when I had eaten some half-soaked lupins I went off. ~Ammianus (2nd century A.D.), in The Greek Anthology, Volume IV, "Book XI: The Convivial and Satirical Epigrams," epigram 413, translated by W.R. Paton, 1918
Lettuce, greens and celery, though much eaten, are worse than cabbage, being equally indigestible without the addition of condiments. Besides, the lettuce contains narcotic properties. It is said of Galen, that he used to obtain from a head of it, eaten on going to bed, all the good effects of a dose of opium. ~William Andrus Alcott, The Young House-keeper: or, Thoughts on Food and Cookery, 1838
A fruit is a vegetable with looks and money. Plus, if you let fruit rot, it turns into wine, something Brussels sprouts never do. ~P. J. O'Rourke, The Bachelor Home Companion, 1987
Green tastes like life, feels like energy, looks like peacefulness, smells like earth's love, sounds like vibrant health (your body listens well). Eat your greens, go wild for greens, play in green, weave green into your colorful daily existence! ~Terri Guillemets, "Go wild for greens," 2008
Though pretty things, they like as not
Are either pithy or too hot,
Nor do you know, till you have bitten,
If you've got a tiger or a kitten.
~Richard Armour, "Radishes," in What Cheer: An Anthology of American and British Humorous and Witty Verse, Gathered, Sifted, and Salted, with an Introduction by David McCord, 1945
The roots most used as table vegetables are turnips, carrots, parsnips, beets, radishes and salsify. The onion is the bulb most generally used as a vegetable and a flavorer. Fruits used as vegetables include eggplant, cucumber, peppers, okra, tomatoes, squash and pumpkin, among others. ~Marion Harris Neil, "The Proper Way to Cook Summer Vegetables," 1908
Sea vegetables are the ocean's mineral and vitamin bank... ~Kristina Turner, The Self-Healing Cookbook, 2002, originally published 1987, kristinaturner.com
If organic is the natural way, shouldn't organic produce just be called "produce" and make the pesticide-laden stuff take the burden of an adjective? ~Terri Guillemets, "Soiled," 2003
According to the latest authorities spring fever, the cause of so much loss of energy, can be prevented by homemakers if they will feed their families in the winter season with plenty of green vegetables. ~Richard Gay Neville, M.D., "Spring Fever," The Forecast, 1921
Life expectancy would grow by leaps and bounds if green vegetables smelled as good as bacon. ~Doug Larson, 1989