Food Jokes for Kids

20 jokes

Food jokes are the ones that get used, because the material is already on the table. Half a joke is the picture in your head, and if the picture is the thing on the plate in front of the child, the joke arrives ready-made.

All 20 are clean, some classic and some our own. They are also, quietly, the most useful ones on the site: a joke about broccoli is a surprisingly good way to get past the moment where a five-year-old has decided to be against broccoli.

  1. Why did the tomato turn red?

    Show the punchline

    Because it saw the salad dressing

  2. What do you call cheese that isn't yours?

    Show the punchline

    Nacho cheese

  3. Why did the egg go to school?

    Show the punchline

    To get eggucated

  4. What did the broccoli say to the pizza?

    Show the punchline

    Nothing. Broccoli doesn't get invited

  5. Why was the pasta so proud?

    Show the punchline

    It was feeling saucy

  6. What do you call a sad strawberry?

    Show the punchline

    A blueberry

  7. Why did the cookie cry?

    Show the punchline

    Because its mom had been a wafer so long

  8. What kind of nut has no shell?

    Show the punchline

    A doughnut

  9. Why don't eggs tell jokes?

    Show the punchline

    They'd crack each other up

  10. What do you call an angry carrot?

    Show the punchline

    A steamed vegetable

  11. Why did the orange stop halfway up the hill?

    Show the punchline

    It ran out of juice

  12. What do you call a potato wearing glasses?

    Show the punchline

    A spec-tater

  13. Why was the mushroom invited to every party?

    Show the punchline

    Because he was a fungi

  14. What do elves make sandwiches with?

    Show the punchline

    Shortbread

  15. Why did the banana wear sunscreen?

    Show the punchline

    Because it was starting to peel

  16. What do you call a fake noodle?

    Show the punchline

    An impasta

  17. Why did the grape stop in the middle of the road?

    Show the punchline

    It ran out of juice too. It's a family problem

  18. What's bread's favorite school subject?

    Show the punchline

    Loaf-ing about

  19. What do you call a peanut in a spacesuit?

    Show the punchline

    An astro-nut

  20. What did the plate whisper to the other plate?

    Show the punchline

    Dinner is on me

How to tell them

Keep these for the table, and specifically for the difficult ten minutes of the meal. A joke about a vegetable does something a discussion about a vegetable never does: it makes the vegetable a character rather than an obligation. That is not a trick to get a child to eat — it usually does not work as one — but it does reliably turn a standoff back into a meal. The other place they earn their keep is the grocery store, where every aisle is a prompt and a bored child suddenly has something to look for. And when the child starts making their own, the food ones are the easiest to invent: take any food, ask what it would say if it could talk, and about one in four answers is a joke.

After the jokes, a story: illustrated bedtime stories on Marytale

Riddles

These 20 food jokes were chosen and written by Marytale for children aged 5 to 10. Some are well-known classics we reworded; the rest are our own.