150 food questions to ask at work, plus 30 food trivia questions
Everyone eats, so everyone has an answer. Questions for the lunch table, the team chat and the potluck, written so nobody’s plate is ever the joke.
Questions about food are the easiest conversation at work: no experience needed, no wrong answers, and a story behind almost every reply. Here are 150 food questions to ask coworkers, sorted by how you will use them: getting to know people, quick this or that choices, would you rather, cooking, food around the world and harmless debates. Then 30 food trivia questions with answers. None of them touch diets, weight or alcohol, and every one works for people who don’t cook or don’t eat a given food.
Best food questions to get to know each other
Start here. Two sets: everyday favorites for a new team, and food memories for when people have a little more time.
25 get to know you food questions
Everyone has an answer, and every answer comes with a story. The easiest way to learn something real about a coworker.
1. What's a dish that tastes better the next day?
2. What's the first dish you learned to make on your own?
3. What's a food you'd happily grow in your own garden?
4. What's a menu item you always talk people into trying?
5. What food do you crave on a cold, gray day?
6. What's a dish you could make with your eyes closed?
7. Which vegetable took you years to come around to?
8. What's a flavor you can't get enough of right now?
9. What's a food you will always say yes to?
10. What's a dish that reminds you of one specific person?
11. What's the best thing to eat on a really hot day?
12. Which fruit deserves more fans?
13. If one sandwich could be delivered to you right now, what's in it?
14. What would your signature dish be on a cooking show?
15. What's a food you've never tried but want to?
16. What do you order when you can't decide?
17. Which food smell makes you hungry the second you notice it?
18. Which condiment do you think is underrated?
19. What's your favorite meal to share with a group?
20. What's a food that tastes better when someone else makes it?
21. What do you pack to eat on a long drive?
22. What's a food you're happy to wait in line for?
23. What's a food you're fussy about getting just right?
24. What's your ideal breakfast on a slow morning?
25. What's a new dish you tried recently?
20 food memory questions
Food memories get people talking for longer than almost any other topic. Save these for a lunch table or a smaller group.
26. What's a dish someone made for you that you still think about?
27. What food takes you straight back to being a kid?
28. What was your favorite school lunch?
29. What treat did you wait all year for as a kid?
30. Whose cooking would you most like to learn from?
31. What was served at the best party you've ever been to?
32. What snack got you through exams or late nights?
33. What's the funniest kitchen disaster you've been part of?
34. What's a meal you cooked that went perfectly?
35. What's a food tradition your friends or family keep?
36. What did your favorite cafe or diner growing up do best?
37. What's the best picnic you remember?
38. Which food reminds you of a particular season?
39. What cake or dessert means celebration to you?
40. What's a restaurant dish you've tried to recreate at home?
41. What did you cook the first time you had your own kitchen?
42. What food did you discover later than everyone else?
43. What kitchen smell will you never forget?
44. What's a recipe someone shared with you that you still use?
45. What food did you eat on a day you'll always remember?
This or that food questions and food would you rather
Quick choices for a big meeting or a chat channel. Ask for the answer first and the reason second.
25 this or that food questions
Two choices, one word. The fastest food questions for a big meeting: everyone answers in the chat at once.
46. Grapes: green or red?
47. Pizza: square cut or triangle slices?
48. Leftovers: cold or reheated?
49. Curly fries or waffle fries?
50. Extra hot sauce or no hot sauce?
51. Pickles on the burger or off?
52. Movie snack: popcorn or candy?
53. Brownies: edge piece or middle piece?
54. Strawberry or blueberry?
55. Sushi or burritos?
56. Rice or noodles?
57. Bagel: toasted or not toasted?
58. Tortilla chips: salsa or queso?
59. Chocolate bar: plain or with nuts?
60. Pretzels or chips?
61. Orange juice: pulp or no pulp?
62. Hummus or ranch?
63. Mashed potatoes or baked potato?
64. Dumplings: steamed or pan-fried?
65. Cinnamon or vanilla?
66. Toast: butter or jam?
67. Burrito or burrito bowl?
68. Frosting first or save it for last?
69. Fresh fruit or dried fruit?
70. Pasta: long shapes or short shapes?
20 food would you rather questions
Everyone picks a side and gets one sentence to argue it. Nobody has to change their mind.
71. Would you rather eat only breakfast foods or only dinner foods for a month?
72. Would you rather have a coffee bar or a smoothie bar in the office?
73. Would you rather eat a perfect taco every day or a perfect pizza once a week?
74. Would you rather cook only with a microwave or only over a campfire?
75. Would you rather eat every meal with chopsticks or with a tiny spoon?
76. Would you rather know every recipe by heart or never burn anything again?
77. Would you rather eat a meal planned by a five-year-old or by a robot?
78. Would you rather judge a baking show or compete on one?
79. Would you rather eat the same lunch every day for a year or never eat the same lunch twice?
80. Would you rather every meal be a buffet or every meal be a surprise menu?
81. Would you rather run a food truck or a fancy restaurant?
82. Would you rather eat only blue food or only square food for a week?
83. Would you rather share your fries or share your dessert?
84. Would you rather cook for twenty people or wash up after twenty people?
85. Would you rather have a fridge that restocks itself or a dishwasher that empties itself?
86. Would you rather live above a bakery or above a pizza place?
87. Would you rather eat soup with a fork or cereal with a knife?
88. Would you rather discover a brand new spice or bring back a snack that was discontinued?
89. Would you rather have unlimited fresh bread or unlimited fresh fruit?
90. Would you rather give up crunchy food or chewy food for a month?
Want more than food? Our this or that questions and would you rather questions cover work, travel and everything else.
Fun food questions about cooking and food around the world
For the lunch table, the potluck and anyone planning a team cooking class.
20 cooking and kitchen questions
For the cooks, and for the people whose best kitchen skill is ordering in.
91. What's one kitchen tool you can't cook without?
92. What's a dish you want to learn to cook this year?
93. What's your fastest weeknight dinner?
94. Which cooking show would you most want to be on?
95. What's the best cooking tip anyone ever gave you?
96. What do you always keep in your pantry?
97. What's the most ambitious thing you've ever cooked?
98. Who taught you to cook, if anyone?
99. What's a kitchen gadget you bought and never used?
100. What do you make when friends come over?
101. What ingredient do you sneak into everything you cook?
102. Do you clean as you go or all at the end?
103. What's the hardest thing you've ever tried to bake?
104. What's the best thing you've ever made in one pan?
105. What would you make in a team cook-off?
106. What's a dish you've slowly perfected over the years?
107. If you had a food blog, what would you call it?
108. Which cuisine would you most like to learn to cook?
109. What's the best thing you can make with five ingredients?
110. What cooking mistake will you never make again?
20 food around the world questions
Ask about tastes and experiences, never about someone's background. Let people share their own food culture if they want to.
111. Which country's food could you eat for a month straight?
112. What's a dish you'd love to try in the place it comes from?
113. What's a breakfast from somewhere else you'd swap yours for?
114. What's a street food you love?
115. Which cuisine do you know least about but want to explore?
116. What's the best thing you've eaten at a food market?
117. What's a dish from your region that visitors should try?
118. What snack from another country would you stock at the office?
119. Which dessert from another country do you love?
120. What's a dish you first tried because a friend or coworker shared it?
121. If you could take a cooking class anywhere in the world, where would it be?
122. What's a dish you've seen online that you want to try for real?
123. Which city would you visit just for the food?
124. What's your favorite kind of dumpling, from any cuisine?
125. What's a bread from another part of the world you love?
126. What's a dish that seems to be made differently everywhere you go?
127. What's a tea or coffee style from another country you'd like to try?
128. What's a holiday food from anywhere that you look forward to?
129. What's a fruit you've only tried once?
130. Which food tradition from another culture would you love to try?
Funny food questions: 20 harmless food debates
Questions that start an argument nobody can lose. Read one out, take a show of hands, and give each side 30 seconds.
131. Hot dog: a sandwich or its own thing?
132. Cereal in milk: soup or not soup?
133. Is a sandwich better cut straight or diagonally?
134. Are pancakes and crepes basically the same thing?
135. Should a pickle come with every sandwich?
136. Are hash browns a breakfast-only food?
137. Is toast just warm bread or a whole new food?
138. Is a smoothie a drink or a meal?
139. Is leaving the pizza crust a crime?
140. Cookies and milk: dunk or sip?
141. Is breakfast the most important meal, or just the best one?
142. Does fruit belong in a savory salad?
143. Is mac and cheese a side or a main?
144. Should the last slice be split or claimed?
145. Do raisins belong in cookies?
146. Chips inside a sandwich: genius or chaos?
147. Is a burrito bowl just a salad with confidence?
148. Is fruit salad a dessert or a side?
149. Ice cream: cone, cup or straight from the tub?
150. Is a taco shell better soft or hard?
Need something to say once the debate dies down? Try our conversation starters for work, sorted by situation.
30 food trivia questions with answers
Settled facts only, with the answer tucked under each question. Ten of these make a good lunch quiz round.
1. What is the main ingredient in guacamole?
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Avocado.2. Marzipan is made mostly from sugar and which nut?
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Almonds.3. What are the main ingredients of hummus?
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Chickpeas and tahini.4. Which spice comes from the dried stigmas of a crocus flower?
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Saffron.5. Eclairs and profiteroles are made from which kind of pastry?
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Choux pastry.6. Tofu is made from the milk of which bean?
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Soybeans.7. Prunes are the dried form of which fruit?
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Plums.8. Paella is a rice dish from which country?
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Spain.9. Kimchi, made from fermented vegetables, is a staple of which country's cooking?
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Korea.10. What is the Japanese name for thin slices of raw fish served without rice?
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Sashimi.11. Risotto is traditionally made with which grain?
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Rice (a short-grain variety such as Arborio).12. Which root vegetable gives borscht its deep red color?
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Beets.13. What is the name of the clarified butter used widely in Indian cooking?
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Ghee.14. In US kitchen measurements, how many teaspoons make one tablespoon?
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Three.15. Tzatziki is a Greek dip made from yogurt, garlic and which vegetable?
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Cucumber.16. Granny Smith and Honeycrisp are varieties of which fruit?
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Apple.17. What does the Italian cooking term al dente mean?
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“To the tooth”: cooked so it's still firm when bitten.18. Poutine, fries with cheese curds and gravy, comes from which country?
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Canada (it started in Quebec).19. Which spice gives most curry powders their yellow color?
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Turmeric.20. The green paste served as wasabi outside Japan is usually made from which root?
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Horseradish, colored green.21. Couscous is made from which kind of wheat flour?
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Semolina, from durum wheat.22. Classic pesto from Genoa is made with basil, garlic, cheese, olive oil and which nut?
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Pine nuts.23. What do people in the UK call an eggplant?
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An aubergine.24. Which spiky Southeast Asian fruit is famous for its strong smell?
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Durian.25. Gazpacho is a Spanish soup. What is its main ingredient, and is it served hot or cold?
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Tomatoes, and it's served cold.26. In ceviche, raw fish is “cooked” in what?
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Citrus juice, usually lime.27. Which pasta's name means “little worms” in Italian?
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Vermicelli.28. Goulash, a stew seasoned with paprika, is the national dish of which country?
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Hungary.29. Which meat goes in a classic Reuben sandwich?
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Corned beef.30. Japanese mochi is made from which ingredient?
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Glutinous (sweet) rice.
Want holiday food in the quiz? Our Christmas trivia has a festive food round, and the Thanksgiving games for work pair well with a team lunch in November.
How to use food questions at work
Five ways to put the questions to work, from ten seconds a day to a full Friday afternoon.
- Lunch table question. Put one question in the middle of the table, on a card or a phone. Food is the one topic everyone at a lunch table already has in common.
- A daily poll in chat. Post one this or that food question each morning in Slack or Teams and let people answer with a reaction. It takes ten seconds and the thread always gets replies.
- Food debate bracket. Pick eight debates, pair them off and let the team vote each round until one is crowned the best food argument. Good for a Friday afternoon or a long offsite drive.
- Potluck name cards. At a potluck, each dish gets a card with its maker's answer to a food memory question. People end up talking about the story, not just the dish.
- A food trivia round. Read ten of the trivia questions below as one round at a team lunch or a holiday party. Teams of four, one answer sheet each, and the answers are under every question.
Five rules that keep food talk kind
- Never comment on what or how much anyone eats, including your own “being good” or “being bad”.
- Make “I don't eat that” a full answer. People skip foods for allergies, faith, health and ethics, and they don't owe anyone a reason.
- Ask about favorites rather than the “weirdest thing” someone eats. A dish that's strange to one person is somebody else's grandmother's cooking.
- Let people share their own food culture if they want to. Don't ask someone to explain or represent a cuisine because of where you think they're from.
- Keep it alcohol-free. Plenty of people don't drink, and food gives you more than enough to talk about.
Want someone to run this for your team?
The best food conversation happens over food. In a virtual cooking class, a kit lands at every door and a live instructor walks the team through making something together on the call; or skip the shipping and watch a chef cook live. Book kits about 3 weeks ahead (international addresses, about 5), or get a free quote.
Three kits and a live chef demo: hosted on Zoom (Teams, Google Meet or Webex on request). Today’s prices below.
