French food metaphors every learner should know

French people, you may have noticed, are always talking about food. They even talk about it when they are not talking about it.

When they need a visual metaphor to describe an emotion or situation, they need look no further than what is on their plate, in the boulangerie or in the vegetable garden.

If you are to join in the conversation, you will need to approach the language with a knife, fork and spoon.

Bread and bakery expressions

Let’s start with bread (le pain). Like in other languages, gagner son pain (to earn one's bread) means to make a living, while long comme un jour sans pain (like a day without bread) means something endless and agonising.

Avoir du pain sur la planche (to have bread on the cutting board) is the equivalent of to have a lot on one's plate.

Pour une bouchée de pain (for a mouthful of bread) means you have bought something for next to nothing.

Still in the bakery, c'est du gâteau is, as you imagine, a piece of cake ie. very easy.

However, if something is difficult, you may say c’est pas de la tarte (it’s not pie).

Dairy products

Then there are dairy products. Mettre du beurre dans les épinards (to put butter in the spinach) means to earn a little extra pocket money.

The expression vouloir le beurre et l'argent du beurre (to want the butter and the money from the butter) is the French version of having your cake and eating it.

En faire tout un fromage (to make a whole cheese out of it) means to overreact or make a big deal out of something small.

Fruit and vegetables

Moving on to fruit and vegetables, I might reprimand you with occupes-toi de tes oignons (take care of your onions ie. mind your own business) or accuse you of raconter des salades (to tell salads ie. tall tales).

Appuyer sur le champignon (press on the mushroom) means to go faster, while tomber dans les pommes (to fall into the apples) means to faint.

Avoir la pêche / la patate / la frite is to be full of beans, but to have a big smile is avoir la banane. Avoir le melon means to be arrogant and full of oneself.

Food and personality

A person’s temperament is often compared to food. Etre une crème (to be a cream) is to be a truly kind, sweet, or lovely person; avoir un cœur d'artichaut (to have an artichoke heart) is to fall in love very easily, and être soupe au lait (to be milk soup) means to be quick-tempered.

Avoir le cerveau en marmelade / en compote means to be completely mentally exhausted or foggy.

When things go wrong

Life events are also recorded in edible metaphors. When things go wrong in a relationship or someone is lying, rouler quelqu'un dans la farine (to roll someone in flour) means to trick or dupe someone.

When it is too late, les carottes sont cuites (the carrots are cooked) means that the outcome is sealed, and c'est la fin des haricots (it's the end of the beans) means that all hope is lost.

If someone or something turns up at the worst possible moment, you can use the expression arriver comme un cheveu sur la soupe (to turn up like a hair in the soup), although it can also be used to imply that something is completely irrelevant.

With all the above, you must keep your wits about you. Sometimes when people are talking about food, they are just talking about food.