Sit back and enjoy food, topics and trends that start on California farms and ranches. take 5
Root, root, root for the farm team
Next time you’re enjoying a hot dog and garlic fries at the ballpark, chew on this: the many and varied ways America’s pastime is intertwined with what’s on the plate. (And we don’t mean the one where the batter’s standing.) Baseball is replete with slang terms derived from food. This goes back at least as far as the early 20th century, when ballplayers began using terms such as “apple” and “onion” in reference to the ball itself. The food slang has only branched out from there. Here are five of the most famous expressions, starting with the very place food and ballplayers come from.
1 Down on the farm Every team in the big leagues runs a farm system, made up of minor-league teams at various levels. The purpose is to develop players’ skills in preparation for (they all hope) eventual promotion to the majors. The players thus engaged are called “farmhands.” Branch Rickey, famous for signing Jackie Robinson for the Brooklyn Dodgers, came up with the idea while working for the St. Louis Cardinals to help “grow” talent for the club.
2 I’ll have a nonfat latte to go A farmhand who gets to go to The Show (the major leagues) but stays only a short while before returning to the minors is said to have had a cup of coffee with the big club. The basis of the joke is that the player was around just long enough to down a cup of java before having to leave.
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March/April 2022
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