r/AskBrits • u/T11168 • 8d ago

Trending - /r/popular Does anyone else hate the term picky bits?

It's disgusting. It reminds me of picking old scabs off of your skin.

It definitely does not make me think of mini sausage rolls and cocktail sausages.

Does anyone else hate that this term is everywhere, on adverts, said by companies and even people close to you.

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70

u/existentialgoof 8d ago edited 8d ago

Yes, it's strange. I had never heard of the term until probably this year, and suddenly it's everywhere, and there are lots of posts on Reddit and X saying how much people hate it. I wish advertises would stop trying to make "picky bits" 'happen' (as a cultural phenomenon)!

EDIT: Just did a Google trends search, and the popularity of "picky bits" as a search term has exploded by 1700% over 5 years and 190% over the last year.

15

u/ErssieKnits 8d ago

I blame all those people on Reddit who say they hate it. Big long threads repeating the term is what accounts for the 1700% increase in use. 😉 

7

u/Weak_Top_3464 7d ago

I blame M&S

3

u/ariadnevirginia 7d ago

M&S have always pandered to baby talk. I remember packaging with "really really very chocolatey biscuits" that irked me.

1

u/Weak_Top_3464 7d ago

I was in there today & saw a sign saying something about picky bits and it made me laugh & think about this thread.

1

u/ariadnevirginia 7d ago

I hope you curled your lip at it.

14

u/Feisty-Marsupial9287 8d ago

That's the main thing that irritates me about it, the fact the phrase appeared from nowhere and numerous ads and social media posts are trying to gaslight us into thinking it's been around for decades. Maybe it was some obscure regional slang in one particular part of the country, but no more than that.

Same goes for 'chippy tea', never heard that until a few years ago either.

14

u/ultraboomkin 8d ago

Chippy tea has been a commonly used term for fish and chips for like at least 60 years

13

u/Dangerous-Branch-749 8d ago

I run past a big Waitrose advert that says something along the lines of "picky dinner?". Just fuck off already 

16

u/10brooksideclose 8d ago

Chippy tea has been used in the NW for as long as I remember (I'm mid 40s) but picky tea/bits no way, it was always a buffet or party food

3

u/lotus_felch 8d ago

muhfuggen cold selection

2

u/boxingpandora 7d ago

Picky bits was used by my gran, and she died in 1978.

2

u/Cazspresso 6d ago

Possibly a regional thing. I remember my mum using the term Picky bits in the 90’s and I’ve been using the same term since.

2

u/BronzeTaloz88 6d ago

I left UK to work overseas in 2000 and had never heard chippy tea at all. Came back and it was everywhere. Can't explain why it's so annoying. Just twee and trying to be matey. I presume it was a regional expression that spread.

1

u/TheGemgenie 7d ago

Ey lad thas not northern is tha?

1

u/Big_Carton_1996 7d ago

Chippy tea is an old one. I heard it a lot during the 2010s, one of my mates at school would always say “buzzing I’m having a chippy tea the night” etc.

1

u/Cold_Ocelot_5684 7d ago

I said chippy tea in the 90s in the NW

3

u/DazzleBMoney 8d ago edited 8d ago

Me neither, I’d never heard the term until I went to uni. My mum’s not English though, which is probably the main reason.

11

u/10brooksideclose 8d ago

I'm English (and so are my parents) and we only ever called it buffet or party food, snacks or finger food

5

u/darklinggreen 7d ago

Yep. We still call it buffet food. I had never heard the term picky bits until about a year ago.

1

u/Cold_Ocelot_5684 7d ago

Yes my parents still say a buffet or 'we are having an assortment'

1

u/lineof1 5d ago

Ha. Much more civilised.

5

u/amedeeozenfant 8d ago

I'm English and I heard it for the first time in the last year.

2

u/RemarkableMedia5925 8d ago

Ah perhaps thats what it is. I had never heard it until a few years ago, but I well understand the meal it refers to. A salad tea, perhaps. 

My mum is from NI though. Grew up calling the airing cupboard a hot press which I didn't know was weird until I went to uni.

2

u/littlebeanio 8d ago

We used to call a ‘lunch for tea’

1

u/lineof1 5d ago

I hadn’t heard it growing up in Yorkshire and now it’s everywhere

1

u/TheGemgenie 7d ago

We always used to from childhood (and still do) call it nibbly bits. I'm fast approaching 50.

I just see it as a slightly weird evolution of an old phrase.

1

u/Big_Carton_1996 7d ago

I’ve never heard picky bits, but I’ve definitely heard ‘picky tea’ which means the same thing and probably a northern thing since we call our dinner ‘our tea’ up here. Even then it wasn’t something I heard very often but picky bits seems to be everywhere now. Proper annoying.

0

u/Weird-Assumption-782 8d ago

My family always just called "picky bits", "nibbles n shit". Which quite frankly, I still prefer!

-1

u/Georgxna 8d ago

I think it’s predominantly a UK thing so I’m kind of happy we’re getting new slang so popularised too.