Om Nom Nom Nom

About

Om Nom Nom Nom is internet slang used to indicate eating. Commonly used in LOLcat image macros, the onomatopoeic phrase translates as “I am absorbed in eating this” or “OMG this is awesome eats, I’m eating it!"

Origin

The phrase is believed to have its origin in the sounds made by the Sesame Street character Cookie Monster^[1] when eating cookies. In the contemporary lolcat usage, the “om” is sometimes omitted, especially when in the middle of the act of chewing as opposed to taking the first bite and then chewing.

“Om Nom” was the first derivation to appear on Urban Dictionary^[2], with the earliest entry dated December 19th, 2004. This entry defines the word as:

An onomatopoeical adjective based on the sound emitted when something is “oh so tasty” (either through hunger or flavorological value) that one gnaws through it without regard to cleanliness or etiquette. This sort of ravenous eating will often result in an “om nom nom nom” noise being emitted from the eater.

Urban Dictionary definition for the similar variation “nom nom nom”^[3] was featured as the Urban Word of the Day on December 10th, 2008.

Spread

The earliest known usage of “om nom nom” in image macros can be found in an ICanHasCheezburger^[4] entry posted on May 2nd, 2007. The two-pane image of a cat posing next to a birthday cake accumulated over 6,000 upvotes and spawned hundreds of iterations on the site.

In August 2007, Omnomnomnom.com^[5] was registered. Nearly a year later in April 2008, Omnomnom.org^[6] was registered. Both of these sites offer a place to upload image macros, as well as to access ones other users have uploaded.

There is also Domo Nom Nom^[7], a blog created in August 2008 that features different items that Domo noms.

If the object “nomming” does not have a mouth, it has become a convention to add eyes, eyebrows and/or sharp teeth over photo-realistic images with large, mouth-like subject matter, indicating a “swallowing up” or other like-failure.

Om Nom Nom Videos

A photo series of objects with paint-added teeth and eyes were set to music in this August 2007 video with 51,000+ views:

In October 2007, the game Team Fortress 2 was released. When an update was released in August 2008 for the Heavy class, a sandwich came with it. Eating it gained a character a 120% health increase while he om nom nom-ed. Instructables offers a recipe for the sandwich as well:

In February 2009, Parry Gripp, the lead singer of pop punk band Nerf Herder uploaded a nom nom nom song/nomming animal compilation. It currently has over six million views.

Om Nom Nom in the Wild

There are several videos of animals making “om nom nom” sounds while eating.

Some kittens in 2008:

h2 .External References

^[1] Wikipedia – Cookie Monster

^[2] Urban Dictionary – Definition for Om Nom

^[3] Urban Dictionary – Definition for Nom

^[4]Definition for Nom Nom Nom

^[5] OmNomNomNom – OmNomNomNom.com

^[6] OmNomNom – OmNomNom.org

^[7] Tumblr – Domo Nom Nom