Origin theories
Literally eating a crow is traditionally seen as being distasteful; the crow, if understood to be a type of raven, is one of the birds listed in Leviticus chapter 11 [4] as being unfit for eating. Scavenging carrion eaters have a long association with the battlefield; "They left the corpses behind for the raven, never was there greater slaughter in this island," says the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle . Along with buzzards, rats, and other carrion-eating scavenging animals, there is a tradition in Western culture going back to at least the Middle Ages of seeing them as distasteful (even illegal at times) to eat, [5] and thus naturally humiliating if forced to consume against one's will. [2]
In the modern figurative sense of being proven wrong, eating crow probably first appeared in print in 1850, as an American humor piece about a rube farmer near Lake Mahopack, New York. [3] The OED V2 says the story was first published as "Eating Crow" in San Francisco's Daily Evening Picayune (3 December 1851), [1] but two other early versions exist, one in The Knickerbocker (date unknown), [3] and one in the Saturday Evening Post (2 November 1850) called "Can You Eat Crow?". [3] All tell a similar story: a slow-witted New York farmer is outfoxed by his (presumed urban) [3] boarders; after they complain about the poor food being served, the farmer discounts the complaint by claiming he "kin eat anything", and the boarders wonder if he can eat a crow. "I kin eat a crow!" the farmer says. The boarders take him up on the challenge but also secretly spike the crow with Scotch snuff. The story ends with the farmer saying: "I kin eat a crow, but I be darned if I hanker after it." [3] Although the humor might produce only a weak smile today, it was probably a knee slapper by 19th-century standards, guaranteeing the story would be often retold in print and word of mouth, thus explaining, in part, the idiom's origin. [3] In 1854, Samuel Putnam Avery published a version called "Crow Eating" in his collection Mrs. Parkington's Carpet-Bag of Fun. [6]
A similar British idiom is to eat humble pie . [2] The English phrase is something of a pun—"umbles" were the intestines, offal and other less valued meats of a deer. Pies made of this were said to be served to those of lesser class who did not eat at the king's/lord's/governor's table, possibly following speculation in Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable but there is little evidence for this. Early references in cookbooks such as Liber Cure Cocorum present a grand dish with exotic spices. Another dish likely to be served with humble pie is rook pie (rooks being closely related to crows). "Pie" is also an antiquated term for the European magpie, [7] a type of crow. There is a similarity with the American version of "umble", since the Oxford English Dictionary defines crow (sb3) as meaning "intestine or mesentery of an animal" and cites usages from the 17th century into the 19th century (e.g., Farley, Lond Art of Cookery: "the harslet, which consists of the liver, crow, kidneys, and skirts)." [8]
Notable examples of use
The following examples illustrate notable uses of the idiom after its origin in the 1850s.
Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936) used this concept in his short story "The Strange Ride of Morrowbie Jukes" (1885). Morrowbie Jukes, a European colonist in India, falls into a sand-pit from which he cannot escape. Another man, a native Indian, is also trapped there who catches wild crows and eats them, saying "Once I was Brahmin and proud man; and now I eat crows." Morrowbie Jukes is also reduced to eating crow. [10]
After incumbent Harry Truman defeated Thomas Dewey in the 1948 United States presidential election despite many media predictions of a Dewey victory, The Washington Post sent a telegram to the victor:
You Are Hereby Invited To A "Crow Banquet" To Which This Newspaper Proposes To Invite Newspaper Editorial Writers, Political Reporters And Editors, Including Our Own, Along With Pollsters, Radio Commentators And Columnists ... Main Course Will Consist of Breast of Tough Old Crow En Glace. (You Will Eat Turkey.) [11]
On 7 November 2000, the election night of the 2000 Presidential Election, after the polls had closed, CNN predicted Al Gore would win Florida and the presidency. Later, CNN retracted the call and put Florida back in the too-close-to-call column before finally awarding Florida to George Bush. One of the anchors, Greenfield, likened CNN's error to eating crow. [12] Many other newspapers throughout the country retracted, and were also said to eat crow. [13]
A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients. Sweet pies may be filled with fruit, nuts, fruit preserves, brown sugar, sweetened vegetables, or with thicker fillings based on eggs and dairy. Savoury pies may be filled with meat, eggs and cheese or a mixture of meat and vegetables.
An apple pie is a pie in which the principal filling is apples. Apple pie is often served with whipped cream, ice cream, custard or cheddar cheese. It is generally double-crusted, with pastry both above and below the filling; the upper crust may be solid or latticed. The bottom crust may be baked separately ("blind") to prevent it from getting soggy. Deep-dish apple pie often has a top crust only. Tarte Tatin is baked with the crust on top, but served with it on the bottom.
The hooded crow, also called the scald-crow or hoodie, is a Eurasian bird species in the genus Corvus. Widely distributed, it is found across Northern, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe, as well as parts of the Middle East. It is an ashy grey bird with black head, throat, wings, tail, and thigh feathers, as well as a black bill, eyes, and feet. Like other corvids, it is an omnivorous and opportunistic forager and feeder.
The Torresian crow, also called the Australian crow or Papuan crow, is a passerine bird in the crow family native to the north and west of Australia and nearby islands in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. The species has a black plumage, beak and mouth with white irises. The base of the feathers on the head and neck are white. The Torresian crow is slightly larger with a more robust bill than the morphologically similar little crow.
You can't have your cake and eat it (too) is a popular English idiomatic proverb or figure of speech. The proverb literally means "you cannot simultaneously retain possession of a cake and eat it, too". Once the cake is eaten, it is gone. It can be used to say that one cannot have two incompatible things, or that one should not try to have more than is reasonable. The proverb's meaning is similar to the phrases "you can't have it both ways" and "you can't have the best of both worlds."
A sin-eater is a person who consumes a ritual meal in order to spiritually take on the sins of a deceased person. The food was believed to absorb the sins of a recently dead person, thus absolving the soul of the person.
Gleaning is the act of collecting leftover crops from farmers' fields after they have been commercially harvested or on fields where it is not economically profitable to harvest. It is a practice described in the Hebrew Bible that became a legally enforced entitlement of the poor in a number of Christian kingdoms. Modern day "dumpster diving", when done for food or culinary ingredients, is seen as a similar form of food recovery. Gleaning is also still used to provide nutritious harvested foods for those in need. In the United States, it is used due to the need for a national network to aid food recovery organizations. This is called the National Gleaning Project, which was started by the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems at Vermont Law and Graduate School to aid those less fortunate much like the old Christian Kingdoms.
A goanna is any one of several species of lizard of the genus Varanus found in Australia and Southeast Asia.
Shoo-fly pie is a type of American pie made with molasses associated with Pennsylvania Dutch cuisine. While shoo-fly pie has been a staple of Moravian, Mennonite, and Amish foodways, there is scant evidence concerning its origins, and most of the folktales concerning the pie are apocryphal, including the persistent legend that the name comes from flies being attracted to the sweet filling.
Some people do not eat various specific foods and beverages in conformity with various religious, cultural, legal or other societal prohibitions. Many of these prohibitions constitute taboos. Many food taboos and other prohibitions forbid the meat of a particular animal, including mammals, rodents, reptiles, amphibians, fish, molluscs, crustaceans and insects, which may relate to a disgust response being more often associated with meats than plant-based foods. Some prohibitions are specific to a particular part or excretion of an animal, while others forgo the consumption of plants or fungi.
Corvus is a widely distributed genus of passerine birds ranging from medium-sized to large-sized in the family Corvidae. It includes species commonly known as crows, ravens, and rooks. The species commonly encountered in Europe are the carrion crow, hooded crow, common raven, and rook; those discovered later were named "crow" or "raven" chiefly on the basis of their size, crows generally being smaller. The genus name is Latin for "raven".
Pigs, widespread in societies around the world since neolithic times, have been used for many purposes in art, literature, and other expressions of human culture. In classical times, the Romans considered pork the finest of meats, enjoying sausages, and depicting them in their art. Across Europe, pigs have been celebrated in carnivals since the Middle Ages, becoming specially important in Medieval Germany in cities such as Nuremberg, and in Early Modern Italy in cities such as Bologna.
Sin-Eater is a name given to several fictional characters appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character usually appears in comics featuring Spider-Man and Ghost Rider.
Kosher animals are animals that comply with the regulations of kashrut and are considered kosher foods. These dietary laws ultimately derive from various passages in the Torah with various modifications, additions and clarifications added to these rules by halakha. Various other animal-related rules are contained in the 613 commandments.
The rook is a member of the family Corvidae in the passerine order of birds. It is found in the Palearctic, its range extending from Scandinavia and western Europe to eastern Siberia. It is a large, gregarious, black-feathered bird, distinguished from similar species by the whitish featherless area on the face. Rooks nest collectively in the tops of tall trees, often close to farms or villages; the groups of nests are known as rookeries.
"Square peg in a round hole" is an idiomatic expression which describes the unusual individualist who could not fit into a niche of their society.
Bipartisan Cafe is a coffee shop and bakery in the Montavilla neighborhood of Portland, Oregon, United States. Since Hobie Bender and Peter Emerson started the business in 2005, the venue has hosted events that include meetings of civic groups and politicians, and viewing parties for political events. Bipartisan Cafe has garnered a positive reception, and has been named as one of Portland's best coffee and pie eateries. The venue's marionberry pie was included in the American Automobile Association's 2022 list of the ten best regional Western dishes.
Birds of a feather flock together is an English proverb. The meaning is that beings of similar type, interest, personality, character, or other distinctive attribute tend to mutually associate.
Depicting African-American children as alligator bait was a common trope in American popular culture in the 19th and 20th centuries. The motif was present in a wide array of media, including newspaper reports, songs, sheet music, and visual art. There is an urban legend claiming that black children or infants were in fact used as bait to lure alligators, although there is no meaningful evidence that children of any race were ever used for this purpose. In American slang, alligator bait is a racial slur for African-Americans.
