34 Ways to Describe Eating and Drinking

For the next few months, weekly writing tips will include word choice suggestions. That includes:

• colorful and original descriptions
• pithy words and phrases
• picture nouns and action verbs
• writing that draws a reader in and addicts them to your voice

I keep a  collection of descriptions that have pulled me into the books. I’m fascinated how authors can–in just a few words–put me in the middle of their story and make me want to stay there. This one’s on how to describe eating and drinking.

A note: These are for inspiration only. They can’t be copied because they’ve been pulled directly from an author’s copyrighted manuscript (intellectual property is immediately copyrighted when published).

General

• Ate with more relish than the food warranted
• I mumbled through a mouthful of beef koon po.
• salmon steaks while Faith made rice and fixed a salad.
• Said finally, shoveling another bite of eggs into his mouth.
• Got the words out through a mouthful of roast beef
• Between bites
• Asked through a mouthful of sushi
• Popped it into her mouth, and said around it
• Nodded as he took another bite
• She asked between bites of calamari
• Asked around a mouthful of…
• Ate a tasteless sandwich
• A steak with sautéed mushrooms and caramelized onions on top
• Spooned into bowls without a lot of ceremony
• She took a slug of the drink
• To avoid potentially poisonous plants, stay away from any wild or unknown plants that have–

1. Milky or discolored sap.
2. Beans, bulbs, or seeds inside pods.
3. Bitter or soapy taste.
4. Spines, fine hairs, or thorns.
5. Dill, carrot, parsnip, or parsleylike foliage.
6. “Almond” scent in woody parts and leaves.
7. Grain heads with pink, purplish, or black spurs.

• Three-leaved growth pattern.

Alcohol

• He poured four fingers of off-brand scotch out of the Johnnie Walker black bottle. He inspected the level in his glass and poured soe more.
• Ice clinked gently in the glass as she rolled it absently between her hands.
• Took a pull on a beer
• I’ll nurse this (a drink)
• Swilling his beer
• Gulping down a beer
• All foam and no beer

Coffee

• The coffee was bitter and so hot it blistered my tongue
• I brought donuts and he supplied some really awful coffee

Restaurants

• Sitting in a red vinyl booth at Martha’s Diner, picking at her tuna salad and listening to Frank and Doug gossip
• Like what, I said around the bite
• Having drinks and sandwiches and laughing often

Hungry

• Getting shot at and knocked in the head made me hungry

Eating

• He blessed himself and started to eat
• I washed down a bit of stuffing with a swallow of beer.
• Look virtuous with cottage cheese rather than despicable with a Pop-Tart, she reckoned
• Click for the complete list of 69 writer’s themed descriptions.

Most popular collections:

34 Ways to Describe Scents

28 Ways to Describe Geeks

47 Ways to Describe Buildings–Homes II

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Jacqui Murray is the author of the popular prehistoric fiction saga, Man vs. Nature which explores seminal events in man’s evolution one trilogy at a time. She is also the author of the Rowe-Delamagente thrillers and Building a Midshipman, the story of her daughter’s journey from high school to United States Naval Academy. Her non-fiction includes over a hundred books on integrating tech into education, reviews as an Amazon Vine Voice,  a columnist for NEA Today, and a freelance journalist on tech ed topics. Look for her next prehistoric fiction, Savage Land, Winter 2024.

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