Man, this was hard. Cars are named for lots of things—animals, cities, letters and numbers jammed together, stupid made-up focus-group non-words, emotions, planets—but one category of thing they’re almost never named after is food. Or beverages. But I like a challenge, so I tried to find every car named for something you can eat or drink. Here’s the menu.
Before I get to the list, some rules. First, I’m not counting any animals, or fish. So while you could eat a Mustang or a Scarab or a Marlin, those don’t count as food/drink-cars. Also, I know Sbarro is the name of a Pizza chain and maker of falconry vehicles, but I’m not counting them, either.
What I am counting are names that come from food, beverages, fruits/vegetables, spices, that sort of thing. Stuff you routinely cram in your mouth, masticate or swallow, and then turn into a combination of more you and some wastes, which you expel.
It’s very possible I missed some, so by all means, if you know of a car named for a food or drink I don’t have, stick it in the comments! Very soon this will be the go-to resource for food and beverage named cars!
1. MGA Developments Hot Dog
This odd but fun-looking little Ford Fiesta-based one-off is sort of like a Speedster version of the Fiesta, and looks pretty fun. It’s also the car that inspired me to start this list, because the name Hot Dog is so perfect and wrong all at the same time.
It’s a three-seater! British, from the late ‘80s. If you had a laptop and this car, you’d pretty much have to use the Windows Hot Dog Stand theme.
2. Nissan Cherry
This is probably the most common of all cars named for food. Outside of Japan and a few other markets, it had less delicious names like Pulsar or F10.
3. Porter
To your grandparents or geeky friends who love crappy old television, this may be the most famous beverage-named car: a 1928 Porter, which was the star of a deeply weird 1960s TV show based on the concept that dead humans re-incarnate as pretty much anything, including cars. It’s generally accepted that the show was terrible.
But, for our purposes, a porter is a beer, so mom the car counts.
4. Sage
Paul Sage was a Parisian maker of cars from 1900-1906. They used two- or four-cylinder engines from a number of manufacturers, and I like that round radiator. Also, sage is a spice, and you can eat it.
5. Suzuki Cappuccino
The Cappuccino is probably the second-most common food- or beverage-named car, after the Nissan Cherry. The Cappuccino is both a fun little Kei-class roadster and a type of espresso coffee drink.
6. Alldays & Onions
This one may be my favorite name of all the food-named cars. Just think how good it would feel to tell people what you drove if you had one of these. “Me? Oh, I drive a 1913 Alldays & Onions Midget. Gotta love that V-twin!”
I bet the look of confusion on the faces of people as they try to parse just what the hell you just said is almost as delicious as those onions themselves.
7. American Chocolate
Yep, that’s right: a company named American Chocolate once made some cars. Later, the company changed their name to Walter, after the owner William Walter who may have—somehow—found that customers were confused by a car made by a company called American Chocolate. I know, right?
8. Toyota Crown Royal Series
Crown Royal is booze, right? So, I say this works.
9. Nissan S-Cargo
If you needed yet another reason to love Nissan’s strange and wonderful Pike Factory line of cars, here you go. The famous snail-like small cargo hauler, the S-Cargo, is named punnishly for escargot, the French dish of cooked snails.
I can’t believe there’s even nine of these. That’s way more than I would’ve guessed. Still, I’m probably missing some, so if you know of any cars named for food or drink, stick them in the comments.
IT’S IMPORTANT.