Monday, April 23, 2012

Things Aren't Homemade Anymore, They're Handcrafted

Homemade Observation


If you say something's homemade you better be planning on taking that to either a craft fair or the county fair.

It seems to me like the phrase homemade is passé.

It seems to me that the most common change in this language substitutes the word "Hand" for "Home" and "Crafted" for "Made," with variations when appropriate.

I've seen signs for "Hand Cut Fries" or "Hand Spun Milkshakes."

Or perhaps if you're buying a home decor item, if it's not hand crafted you might be in the market for something "Locally Crafted."

Homemade Arnold Palmer

The other night at a friends house when available beverages were offered Arnold Palmer (lemonade and ice tea mixed) was offered, and when clarification was requested on the brand, it was mentioned that it was "homemade" although it struck me that this term didn't match modern terminology.

So I brought up this observation raised above, but we were stuck because "Handmade Lemonade" or any beverage product of the like sounded sort of unsanitary. But somehow "Handcrafted Lemonade" some how seems appropriate, and it can only be the ever changing culture of language.

Perhaps, there still is a place for "homemade" foods, but somehow it seems this phrase has developed a granny phrase to it. Although, if I had been offered a "handcrafted Arnold Palmer" I think I would have had ridiculously high expectations for the lofty language so maybe in some cases the better substitute for "homemade" would simply be to say "we made it ourselves."

1 comment:

Grete said...

Yeah, "homemade" or "handcrafted" don't seem to describe that kind of drink... Hand mixed? Hand-squeezed (if they made the lemonade)?