To be fair, there are much worse sounding words out there. ‘Lugubrious’ is pretty off-putting, ‘goosepimple’ rolls off the tongue like expired milk, and ‘moist’ won some kind of poll as the most hated word by the world’s English speakers. There are more annoying words being thrown around out there, too. If I had to pick a candidate, I’d probably gun for Oxford English Dictionary’s word of 2013: selfie. Bumping into the word foodie, however, and even being labelled one myself, is a genuine occupational hazard.

A foodie, according to The Merriam Webster definition, is a person who enjoys and cares about food very much. That seems fairly unobjectionable, but I’m not alone in my discomfort with the term: The Atlantic has written screeds on the subject and just last week, The New York Times’s Mark Bittman made the case for rethinking the term. So what is it about ‘foodie’ that makes us cringe?

There’s no denying that our vocabulary requires a word for this; maybe it’s thanks to MasterChef, maybe it’s the backlash against big food business, or maybe it’s entirely the fault of the hipster, but the general population certainly seems to care about food way more than they used to.

‘When did young people start spending 25% of their paychecks on pickled lambs tongues?’ asked New York magazine in a 2012 article. Following the incredible digestive outings of 27-year-old New York resident Diane Chang, the writer marvels at the unbelievable amount of money, time and energy spent on food by young people.

New York – the natural habitat of foodies – photo by Katharine Jacobs

Working on the Eat Out team, I have to confess I’m guilty of some similar excesses. (I wore one pair of sandals all summer, but who needs shoes when you can have properly aged cheese?) And I was totally got swept up in the food-related mania on a recent trip to America. But there’s something that makes me hesitant to embrace the label foodie.

Even Diane from the NY magazine article, who in one week dined at fourteen separate establishments, rejects the label. “I’m not a foodie, I just like what I like,” she says. “Yes, I know, it’s just like hipsters saying, ‘I’m not a hipster.’ ”

The reason for this, I think, is that much like hipster, the word foodie has come to mean more than the sum of its parts. Urban Dictionary defines foodie as ‘a douchebag who likes food’. Indeed, it’s hard to separate the honest love of food from that air of condescension and faintly moralising stance employed by some foodies. (Because I’m fairly sure most of the world would eat free-range, organic, fair trade and GMO-free if they could afford it.)

All of the above notwithstanding, I agree that we need some new nouns. Aside from reverting to the rather prudish-sounding ‘food lover’ or even worse, ‘gourmand’, I really haven’t found a viable alternative.

In the age of foragers and fruitarians and even the freegans (environmental activists who scavenge for free food), I have, however, come up with my own terms for eating behaviour that falls under the foodie umbrella. You’re welcome, Oxford English Dictionary.

The cronut beloved of foodies – photograph by John Gillespie

Frengatarian

This word encompasses the growing number of individuals who eat vegetarian unless there’s free-range meat to be had. It’s a noble choice, but one does kind of want to smack them when they call ahead of the dinner party to ask if the meat will be free-range. Perhaps having their own label will help.

Frendie

These trend-followers will go to great lengths to try the most obscure dishes. It can be tempting to mess with them. (We often hold ourselves back from writing irresponsible trend pieces on our favourite dishes in the hope that they’ll catch on. But seriously, marzipan is going to be HUGE, guys.)

Foodist

This is an individual who is passionate about food but demonstrates extreme prejudices against certain ingredients, citing texture, colour and/or flavour as a reason for their repulsion. Most of us learn to like the sharper, acquired tastes of blue cheese and olives as our tastebuds decay and die. But in some cases, the prejudice lasts a lifetime.

Banter

Currently responsible for a countrywide cauliflower shortage and a growing anxiety in the pizza and pasta sector, these individuals display an unusual enthusiasm for saturated fats and extremely threatening foodist behaviour towards carbohydrates.

Latte art-the bread-and butter of the insta eater – Photo by iStock

Foover

Like hoovers, these people inhale food, but are not particularly discriminating in their choices. They will wolf down a burger with equal enthusiasm, whether it is gourmet or gristle based.

Defusional

The food delusional want to have their cake and eat it too. A typical order from a food delusional: an eggless omelette. Or, in their less sophisticated form: a burger with large fries and a diet Coke.

Insta-eater

These individuals base their food choices entirely on aesthetic concerns and are very highly strung, thanks to the huge volume of caffeine they photograph and ingest.

Do you have a suggestion for you’re an alternative word for foodie? Let us know in the comments.