Who's the cartoon character who stole pies off windowsills?

November 20, 2006 8:51 PM

There's a standard cartoon routine, where a woman whose head you can't see puts a pie on the windowsill, "fingers of aroma" waft off the pie and swirl around until they find this particular cartoon character and pull him towards the pie which he then discovers and steals. I'm pretty sure it's a Looney Tunes character. It was a recurring schtik but I'm pretty sure it was always the same Looney Tunes character. Which one?
posted by mikemonteiro to food & drink (16 comments total)

Didn't Dennis the Menace have this routine?
posted by number9dream at 8:53 PM on November 20, 2006

I'd say Daffy Duck did this, but I can't validate it.
posted by BradNelson at 9:00 PM on November 20, 2006

Tom and Jerry used this regularly.
posted by chrisroberts at 9:00 PM on November 20, 2006

I wonder if it's Yogi Bear from Pie Pirates
posted by jessamyn at 9:01 PM on November 20, 2006

Something like this was done in one of the "Dexter's Lab" cartoons, only it was muffins instead of a pie.
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 9:06 PM on November 20, 2006

This was used in many, many cartoons. Off the top of my head, I can say that it definitely happens in Friz Freleng's Pigs Is Pigs, which stars a one-off pig character (not Porky).

And the "woman whose head you can't see" makes me think that you might be thinking of "Tom & Jerry" cartoons - the "mammy" character was only ever shown from the knees down.
posted by Dr. Wu at 9:09 PM on November 20, 2006

Dr. Wu is absolutely right, and it was rarely done better than in Feed the Kitty. Some of the details are different, but I'm guessing this is the Looney Tune you are looking for.
posted by samh23 at 10:01 PM on November 20, 2006

Nevermind, baking is only tangentally in that one.

Still, enjoy.
posted by samh23 at 10:03 PM on November 20, 2006

I'm almost positive I've seen Fred Flintstone wafted on seductive vapors to a waiting meal, but I'll be darned if I can cite a specific episode.
posted by Opposite George at 10:21 PM on November 20, 2006

Another vote for Yogi Bear. That's not to say that others haven't done it, but YB is who I associate with that gag. (Which incidentally was wickedly spoofed in a Robert Smigel SNL cartoon where Michael Jackson smells a young boy.)
posted by pmurray63 at 11:09 PM on November 20, 2006

The "fingers of aroma" gag was used to great effect in Bugs Bunny and the Three Bears", and I'm sure there were other Bugs cartoons where he has drawn into situations by the temping tendrils of scent given off by carrot stew. But the headless woman sounds an awful lot like Mammy Two-Shoes, and there are a lot of Yogi Bear cartoons involving pie, but the aroma gag wasn't as elaborate (because of limited animation) as it was in the Warners cartoons.... I can't think of a particular character that regularly combined all these elements.
posted by maryh at 2:00 AM on November 21, 2006

It happens frequently in Tom and Jerry cartoons, yep. And probably even more frequently in the older Mickey Mouse cartoons. We have a few Mickey Mouse cartoon collections on DVD, and I swear every other cartoon features a plot in which Mickey is some kind of vagabond, wanders by Minnie's farm looking for work, goes out to the fields to toil away, and gets lured to the farmhouse by the scent of one of Minnie's pies. I never realized until right now that there are a lot of overt sexual overtones and fantasies being played out in these cartoons.
posted by iconomy at 5:52 AM on November 21, 2006

I always think of this with Yogi bear, though I am sure it's been done in many cartoons.
posted by rmless at 7:50 AM on November 21, 2006

Foghorn Leghorn comes to mind for me.
posted by kidsleepy at 10:09 AM on November 21, 2006

I also picture the character being lifted off the ground, so they sort of float uncontrollably towards the window.
posted by nekton at 10:33 AM on November 21, 2006

Somewhere recently I saw this gag lampooned. The window was fake and the baker was a robot, I think. Not sure about the later, and I'm thinking ::damn, what was I watching??::

Definitly sounds like Tom & Jerry (NOT a Looney Tune), but could be anything.
posted by Goofyy at 4:38 AM on November 22, 2006