Edible Theme Naming

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

A rather silly form of Theme Naming is to name characters after food and drinks. This tends to be done in comedic and child-oriented works, because it is very difficult to take someone named Sausage seriously. However, such a character may be afforded some dignity by being named after a food in a foreign language; somebody named Okonomiyaki sounds rather more impressive to an English speaker than one named Pancake.

Examples of Edible Theme Naming include:

Anime and Manga

  • Many characters in Part 5 of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure are named after Italian foods. Examples include Pannacotta Fugo, Risotto Nero, Melone, Cioccolata, Gelato, Sorbet, Prosciutto, Pesci, Formaggio, and Mario Zucchero.
  • The heroes of Sorcerer Hunters are all named for foods, mostly sweets or pastries ("Tira Misu" and "Marron Glace", for example).
    • Akahori seems to be a fan of this, since the main cast of Chivas 1-2-3 is named after liquor and Knights of Ramune has much of its cast named after other, more child-friendly drinks. See Saber Marionette J below for more of his work.
  • Likewise the five girls of the two main Galaxy Angel casts are also all named after foods, mostly desserts. Both Karasuma Chitose and Iyazoi Natsume, each the Sixth Ranger of her group, have fairly normal Japanese names. The villains of the Galaxy Angel video games have an alcohol theme going on, which explains Tequila's possession in the first game in which she appears.
  • Dragon Ball used this a lot, in addition to other forms of theme naming:
    • Full blooded Saiyans are named after vegetables: Kakarot (Carrot), Nappa (a type of Cabbage), Vegeta(ble), Raditz (Radish); "Saiya", is an anagram of "yasai", meaning "vegetable"...).
    • The henchmen of Frieza, an enemy of the Saiyans has several henchmen named after fruits: Cui (kiwi), Dodoria (dorian), Zarbon (the Japanese name for the pomelo). Much later, it is revealed that the ancient enemy of the Saiyans is the Tsuffles, or "tsufuru" in Japanese, which is an anagram for "furutsu", or "fruit".
    • Also, the sentai parody team the Ginyu Special Corps has members named after dairy products, Ginyu (cow's milk), Butta (butter), Gurd (yogurt), Jheese (cheese), Reacoom ("Rikumu" is an anagram for "kurimu", or "cream").
    • And Goku and Satan's mutual granddaughter gets two references: "Pan" which is Japanese (and Spanish, and Portuguese, and...) for "bread," as her father's name, Gohan, means "rice;" they're both carbohydrates and staple foods, and it also refers to the satyr, Pan, who has the physical form we associate with Satan.
    • In the filler episodes of Piccolo Jr. Saga, Mr. Popo sent Goku to a forest and met Mousse. He, his wife Eclair, and all nine children are named after sweets: Crepe, Cookie, Cocoa, Creampuff, Jam, Jelly, Donuts, Pudding, and Cupcake.
    • In Dragonball Z, every Namekian besides Piccolo is named for Slug, Snail or a dish which uses those as the main ingredients. (Everyone in Piccolo's family is named after musical instruments.)
    • This also applies to other characters like Kuririn (the "kuri" means chestnut), Puar and Oolong (types of tea), etc. Supposedly, Akira Toriyama did this so it would be easy to remember character's names.
    • Tenshinhan and Chiaotzu each have the name of each other's favorite foods.
    • The Gods of Destruction from Dragon Ball Super and their respective assistants are all named after alcoholic drinks.
  • The girls of Tokyo Mew Mew are all named after plants or desserts, and their last names follow the pattern of Color Place (Momomiya = Peach Shrine, Midorikawa = Green River, etc.) Their alien foes are named after filled pastry items (Quiche, Tart, and Pie).
  • The main marionettes from Saber Marionette J are named after fruits.
  • The names of the Kurosaki siblings in Bleach are all puns on fruits. (Ichigo = strawberry, Karin = quince, Yuzu = citron)
  • All of the members and trainees of the Seven Shinobi Swordsmen of the Mist in Naruto (with the exception of Raiga from the Filler, but it's probably best to assume he isn't canon), have names dealing with fruit: Zabuza Momochi (momo=peach), Kisame Hoshigaki (hoshigaki=dried persimmon), Chojuro (Asian pear), and Suigetsu+Mangetsu Hozuki (Hoo=ground cherry and Hozuki=Chinese lantern fruit).
  • The Musk Dynasty in Ranma ½ has Herb, Lime, and Mint, while the Phoenix Tribe has Saffron (after the rice), Kiima (after keema), Koruma (from "korma", a curry dish) and Masara (masala, a mix of spices). Herbology martial artists Pink and Link have Theme Twin Naming. The Guide (who is named after his profession) has a daughter named Plum. And let's not forget Lychee, from Big Trouble In Nekonron, China. Pantyhose Taro (who was baptized and named by Happosai) fell victim to a whole other kind of Theme Naming, but he met Rouge, and a different Saffron.
  • In Air Gear, the Noyamano sisters (members of Sleeping Forest) are nicknamed after fruits: Rika (pomegranate), Ringo (apple), Ume (plum) and Mikan (tangerine). Ringo's name is lampshaded when Rika threatens her by crushing an apple while hinting obliquely at her fate should she disobey.
  • Rosario + Vampire has vampire sisters named Moka/Mocha and Kokoa/Cocoa, their elder Karua/Kahlua, and their adopted(and thus named not quite to theme) sister Akuha/Aqua.
    • Just about the whole family is part of the them naming father Issa (lit. "one [cup of] tea"), Kahlua and Koka's mother Gyokuro (a type of green tea), and dog Earl Grey.
  • Samurai Pizza Cats has two characters named after pizza toppings.
  • Martian Successor Nadesico‍'‍s Magical Girl parody Show Within a Show, Magical Princess Natural Lychee, includes an antagonist of the titular character who is named Rambutan. (Lychee and Rambutan are both Asian tropical fruits.)
  • In Yes! Pretty Cure 5, the mascots are all named after food; Coco and Nuts (their names are a pun on 'coconut'), Milk, Syrup, and don't even get me started on the royals. Similarly, in Fresh Pretty Cure, not only the mascots, Chiffon and Tart (not the ones mentioned above), follow the same pattern, but the Cures also do, as their Cure forms are named after fruits: Cure Peach, Cure Berry, Cure Pine (as in 'pineapple', not 'pine tree'), and Cure Passion (as in 'passionfruit').
  • Early in One Piece, Usopp's "pirate crew" is made of 3 little boys named Carrot, Pepper, and Onion. Their hairstyles resemble the food they're named after.
  • In Urusei Yatsura, there is a group of Unknown Rivals to Lum, Oyuki, and Benten. They are named Sugar, Ginger, and Pepper.
  • Most of the characters (and all of the place names) in Jing: King of Bandits are named for alcoholic beverages. "Jing" is actually supposed to be "Gin" (the spelling is intentional on the author's part, since "Gin" would connote a much different pronunciation in Japanese); Kir (Jing's bird sidekick) is a liqueur; and their signature attack "Kir Royale" is a cocktail made with said liqueur.
  • One of the Sailor Moon movies has a team of villains who are all named after sweet items.
  • The antagonists of Detective Conan are given liqueur codenames like Gin, Vodka, Vermouth, Kir, etc.
  • Most of the main female casts of Dog Days are named after bread and sweets, either in their first or last names - Princess Millhiore F. Biscotti, Tsundere Eclair, Mad Scientist Riccotta, Samurai Brioche d'Arquien, Ninja Yukikaze Panettone, etc...
  • VS Knights Lamune & 40 Fire, and it's Hotter and Sexier OAV Knights of Ramune/VS Knights Lamune Fresh have this trope, although the latter seems to have a lot more characters to this effect.
  • Hanaukyo Maid Tai. Taro's personal maid staff.
    • Season 1: Lemon, Marron (chestnut) and Melon
    • Season 2: Ichigo (strawberry), Ringo (apple) and Sango (maple)
  • The faeries in A Little Snow Fairy Sugar are named after spices: Sugar, Salt, Pepper, Basil, and so on.
  • Mob Psycho 100 takes place in Condiment City, and all the locations are named after condiments or spices: the main character goes to Salt Middle School, for example.

Comic Books

Fan Works

  • All named Seeq in The Tainted Grimoire are named after a type of meat.
    • First, there is T-bone.
    • Second, there is Ribs.
    • Third, there is Sir Loin.

Films

  • Brand-name junk foods are used for this purpose in Idiocracy, where Joe Bauers' attorney is named Frito and the President is Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho.
  • In the film What a Girl Wants, two of Daphne's debutante friends are named Peach and Pear. They apparently have a sister named Parsnip; she doesn't get out much.
  • The Penderghast family in Easy A are all named after food. Daughter/Protagonist Olive, Mother Rosemary, Father Dill and Brother Chip.
  • As might be expected, just about every named character from "Sugar Rush" in Wreck-It Ralph references candy in some way (although some, like Taffyta Muttonfudge and Rancis Fluggerbutter, reference other foods).

Literature

  • Anything Japanese in Good Omens is named after food, including a model of car called the Wasabi and a ship called the Kappamaki.
  • The Fudge series gives us Farley "Fudge", and Tamara "Tootsie." Peter lampshades this at one point by commenting that his parents really wanted a candy shop.
  • Apparently Vicky Holmes was hungry when she wrote the Warrior Cats book SkyClan's Destiny... it introduces cats named Egg, Nutmeg, and you could even count Velvet if you think of red velvet.
  • Many of the rats in The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents are named after food (like Dangerous Beans, Peaches and Sardines) or words related to food (like Additives and Nourishing). This is because they have learnt a lot of their vocabulary from reading food packaging.

Live-Action TV

  • In-universe example in the BBC comedy drama Cruise of the Gods. The creator of a short-lived cult sci-fi series finally tires of the Fandom trying to find hidden meanings in the exotic character names and reveals that they were all just anagrams of dishes at his local curry house. (And you're right, it does stretch credulity that nobody would have noticed this before.)
  • On Glee, all of Will's love interests are named after food: Terri Delmonico (a type of steak), Emma Pillsbury, Suzie Pepper, and Rachel Berry.

Other

  • The 1960s/70s British stop-go animation children's program The Herbs and its spin off The Adventures of Parsley, had in addition to the eponymous lion, characters called Dill, Basil, Sage, etc.
  • Android OS: since version 1.5, and until the tenth major release (where they dropped the theme and released it as just Android 10) every major release has been named for a dessert item:
    • 1.5 - Cupcake
    • 1.6 - Donut
    • 2.0 - Eclair
    • 2.2 - Froyo[1]
    • 2.3 - Gingerbread
    • 3.x - Honeycomb
    • 4.0.x - Ice Cream Sandwich
      • 4.1.x to 4.3.x - Jelly Bean
      • 4.4.x - Kit-Kat (they got an agreement with Nestlé for the use of the name)
    • 5.x - Lollipop
    • 6.x - Marshmallow
    • 7.x - Nougat
    • 8.x - Oreo (They did an agreement with Nabisco for the name use, and even presented the release from a former Oreo factory!)
    • 9.0 - Pie

Video Games

  • The Frost Five in Soul Hackers. Strawberry Frost, Lemon Frost, Melon Frost, Milk and Curry Frost, Blue Hawaii Frost.
  • In the obscure Game Boy RPG Great Greed (also known as Vitamina Kingdom), all the friendly NPCs and regions have food-related names. For example, the five princesses are named Candy, Cup Cake, Truffle, Gum Drop, and Citrus.

Gum Drop: ...so the programmer gave us strange names, you have a problem with that?

  • In Leisure Suit Larry 6, all of the girls Larry has a chance at scoring with are named after alcoholic beverages, from Char Donnay to Thunderbird.
  • The Goldfish Poop Gang from Chrono Trigger, in the Japanese original, was named after dressings: Vinegar, Mayonnaise and Soysauce. The sequel Chrono Cross features Solt and Peppor, the Shaker Brothers, who are at one time joined by Ketchop.
  • Many of the areas of Super Mario World are so named: Donut Plains, Vanilla Dome, Chocolate Island, Cheese Bridge, Butter Bridge, and Soda Lake.
  • Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia's cats are all named after different ingredients.
  • Kirby's Adventure has levels named: Vegetable Valley, Ice Cream Island, Butter Building, Grape Garden, Yogurt Yard, and Orange Ocean.
    • Repeated in Kirby's Return to Dream Land: Cookie Country, Raisin Ruins, Onion Ocean, White Wafers, Nutty Noon, Egg Engines, and Dangerous Dinner.
    • Also, in Kirby and the Amazing Mirror: Cabbage Cavern, Mustard Mountain, Carrot Castle, Olive Ocean, Peppermint Palace, and Candy Constellation.
  • Kitchen Island from Wario Land 1 includes Rice Beach, Mt Teapot, Sherbet Land, Stove Canyon, SS Teacup, Parsely Woods, Fork Tree and Syrup Castle. Incidentally, the pirate leader is also named after food...
  • The video game Panic Restaurant has levels named after food, full of food-themed enemies.
  • In Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, Luigi tells of his adventures in the Waffle Kingdom with Princess Éclair, King Chestnut and Minister Crepe.
  • The names of two (out of five) of the lead characters of Tales of Phantasia is a gag about Mint and Watercress salad, although the "joke" is Lost in Translation because the hero's name is consistently romanized as "Cless."
  • From his appearance, Montblanc from Final Fantasy Tactics Advance seems to be named after the Mont Blanc pastry.
  • Practically everyone in Magical Starsign. There are different naming themes for different groups of characters. For example, the moles are named after cheeses, and the dwarves are named after sauces. Just to name a few more: the solar system where the game takes place is called Balkava, there's a school principal named Biscotti, a police officer named Brie, two salamanders named Chowder and Bisque...
  • In Brave Fencer Musashi, most of the inhabitants of Alucaneet Castle are named after meat (eg. Princess Fillet, Acrobat Sausages, Scribe Shanky, Butler Livers) while most of the characters from the Thirstquencher Empire are named for drinks (Gingerelle, Bubbles, etc.).
  • Most of the major characters in Steambot Chronicles are named for seasonings—with pretty much anyone else who's at all significant being named for a non-edible plant if they ran out. Lampshaded in-game—when you look at the spice rack of Mrs. Echinacea, it says the jars contain seasonings. Or people, it's hard to tell.
  • Two of the main female characters from Cla Dun: This is an RPG are named after dessert foods (Pudding and Sherbet).
  • The Pinatas in Viva Pinata are named after candies and dessert foods (Mousemallow, Taffly, Horstachio, etc.)
  • In Disgaea: Hour of Darkness, the angels are named after desserts. Flonne (pronounced as flan) and Seraph Lamington are examples.
  • Tail Concerto has the twofer food reference with its main character Waffle Ryebread, and his assistant is named Panta.
  • In The Curse of Monkey Island, members of the Goodsoup family have soup-related first names like Minnie Stronie and Wonton. There is also a guest at their inn named Charles de Goulash.
  • Cooking Mama, the titular character's daughter is named Ichigo (strawberry) while her son is named Ringo (Apple).
  • Every single gym leader in Pokémon manages to have a Japanese name that is both the name of a plant or fruit, and has something to do with their Pokémon type. The English names are simply type references.
  • The names of Death Adder's minions in Golden Axe are all references to alcoholic beverages (with some of the spellings changed to avoid trademark infringement): we have Heninger (Henninger), Longmoan (Longmorn), the Zuburoka (Zubrowka) amazons (whose individual members are named after different brands of vodka), the Bad Brothers (a mistranslation of "Bud", as in "Budweiser") and the Bitter knights.

Web Comics

  • In Adventurers!!, Karashi's sister's name is Mizuna. Karashina and Mizuna are both Japanese mustard plants. Not a coincidence; when the two square off against each other, the name of the story arc is "Mustard Wars".
  • The Warhammer 40,000 fan webcomic Gone to Ground's Imperial Guardsmen's names are chock full of this trope—Sergeant Cooke, Private Eggleston (who's nicknamed 'Eggs' by his friend anyway), Corporal Hamm...
  • Cucumber Quest is the story of Cucumber and his sister Almond, seeking to save the Donut Kingdom and its various food-named inhabitants from an ancient evil. Along the way, they even run into a Quirky Miniboss Squad whose members are named Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato.
  • Trigger Star: The Five-Man Band (including the Team Pet) and most of the antagoinsts are named after food items. For instance: the "hero" is Avocado Guacamole and the Big Bad is called Black Licorice.
  • In Ciem, "Candi Levens" is phonetically identical to the phrase: "candy leavens," hence, a dessert bread. Her first husband, Denny Levens, is named after the restaurant "Denny's." Therefore, while she was married to him, she was,in a sense, "Denny's Dessert Bread."
  • In PPepper&Carrot the witches are all named after spices (Pepper, Saffron, Shichimi, Coriander, Thyme, Cayenne, Cumin) while their pets are named after other foods (Carrot, Truffel, Yuzu, Mango).

Web Original

Western Animation

  • All the characters on Chowder are named after food. (Chowder, Panini, Schnitzel, Gazpacho, etc.)
  • Patti Mayonnaise in Doug
  • The titular characters of PB&J Otter
  • Many of the characters in Strawberry Shortcake are named for various desserts.
  • In Biker Mice From Mars, the Plutarkians are all named for cheeses—for example, Lawrence Limburger, who certainly lives up to his name.
  • As the title indicates, all the members of the Sushi Pack (and their Evil Counterpart, the Legion of Lowtide) are named after the kind of sushi they are.
  • Mac and Cheese from Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends.
    • Then there's Coco, Fluffernutter, Crackers, and Nuts. (The last two were each one-shot joke characters, with Nuts not even appearing in an actual episode).
  • The Proud Family has Dijonay and her siblings named after spices. Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Basil, Salt, Pepper, Dijonay (obviously), Cayenne, Paprika, and Tabasco.
    • In the Proud family is Suga Mama.
    • And the production company is Jambalaya Studios.
  • The Apple clan in My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic.
    • Also, Pinkie Pie works for Mr. Carrot Cake and Mrs. Cup Cake in a bakery, and also babysits their children, Pumpkin Cake and Pound Cake.
  • Monterey Jack's family from Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers are all named after types of cheese.
  1. ↑ Frozen Yogurt
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