Throwing Salt Over Your Shoulder
According to Dayna Winters, one of the co-authors of Wicca: What's the Real Deal? Breaking Through the Misconceptions ( Schiffer Books, 2011): "The practice of throwing salt over your shoulder has a long history. Superstition holds that when you spill salt, you are ‘risking looking the devil in the eye.’ To cast the salt over one’s shoulder is to prevent this from happening. The reason the left shoulder is commonly picked for throwing salt over the shoulder is because the left-hand side has long been associated with all things sinister; i.e., the left-hand path, and not long ago, being left-handed was also viewed as sinister, etc. The connection of sinister things and the left-hand side is derived from biblical connections; it is said in the Bible that when people adhere to the word of God, they will one day sit on the right-hand side of God. Thus, the left-hand side became associated with sinister concepts.

“Salt is a preservative, and in the Bible, Lot’s unnamed wife was turned into a pillar of salt because she looked back on what was happening to Sodom and Gomorrah as it was being destroyed; she didn’t adhere to the instruction of God and was punished for doing so. The story is a warning of not listening to the instruction of God, but it also holds the moral that you should not waste your time looking into the unchangeable past. The act of throwing salt over one’s shoulder may be linked to this depiction in the Bible, and it could have the subtle connection of remembering what happened to Lot’s wife if you look behind you or upon the past.

“Interestingly, salt has been used for the purposes of divination. The ancient Chinese would burn salt and read the ashes to foretell the future. If we consider this notion of using salt to foretell future events in some cultures, it makes the punishment of Lot’s wife even more intriguing; she is punished for looking back by being turned into a mineral used for the purposes of foretelling the future."

Rice Thrown at Weddings
Rice is “thrown at the couple after a wedding ceremony because grains are a symbol of fertility, an association that dates back to the ancient Romans. After all, marriage hasn't historically been about love, but about having lots of babies to carry on a family's name and inheritance. Heck, a lot of grandchild-less mother-in-laws are still pushing that idea," says Emmie Scott, a blogger for The Morton Report.

And what about the urban myth that we should not throw rice because it is harmful to birds? According to an article by Dr. James Krupa of the University of Kentucky that was published in The American Biology Teacher, “The urban myth that rice is harmful to birds is well established. It states that throwing rice at weddings attracts birds that eat the rice. After these birds drink, the rice then absorbs water and expands. The rest of the myth has two versions. One version is that the rice expands, choking the bird to death. The more gruesome version is that the rice expands in the bird’s stomach’ causing it to explode, thus killing the bird." Krupa did various experiments with different types of rice and did find that white instant rice can expand and break a wet paper bag. He also determined that if a bird ate enough instant white rice it could possibly expand enough to injure the bird. He determined that birds don't really like instant white rice, but just to be on the safe side, go with the healthier choice — brown rice — when throwing rice at a wedding.

Chewing the Fat
Today this means to have a conversation or make small talk. According to the book Food: A Dictionary of Literal and Nonliteral Terms by Robert A. Palmatier (Greenwood, 2000): "The origin of this expression may have been sailors who chewed salt pork (while working together aboard ship) and talked at the same time. It’s quite a leap from the ship to the farmhouse, but that’s where the expression became a metaphor when women gossiped at length at a quilting bee, although no actual fat was being chewed. Nowadays, people chew the fat when they talk informally with their friends and relatives over coffee and doughnuts, talking about anything that comes to mind, from gossip to sports. The British version of the metaphor, to chew the rag (same meaning), calls into question the nautical origin of the expression but adds nothing to determining its real origin."

Bringing Home the Bacon
To win a prize; to support a family. According to Food: A Dictionary of Literal and Nonliteral Terms: "The origin of this metaphorical expression is obscure, and the date of its first appearance in print is surprising. The earliest suspected source is the case of a man winning a whole side of bacon as a prize and taking it home to his wife. The place was Dunmow (Essex), England, and the prize was called the Dunmow Flitch. The man knelt on the steps of the church and was able to swear that he had been happily married for the past year and a day. Between A.D. 1244 and 1772, only seven other men won the Flitch, an average of one winner every 66 years! The second suspected source is the appearance in a 1725 English dictionary of thieves’ cant of the word bacon, defined as ‘loot’ from a robbery. It is possible, of course, considering that the Dunmow Flitch was still being offered in 1725, that the thieves stole the term from the Church, or that one of the happily married winners of the Flitch had turned into a happily married crook and took the expression with him to jail. The third suspected source is an American one, probably originating in the 19th century, which involved the (continuing) practice of turning children loose in a pen of one or more greased pigs at a country fair. The child who caught the pig was awarded it as a prize and allowed to take it home, where his/her parents could then have it butchered and turned into pork, ham, and bacon to feed their family."

Toast
According to Food: A Dictionary of Literal and Nonliteral Terms: "An expression of honor accompanied by a raised glass. How a wish for good health, good luck, and long life came to be named after a piece of browned bread is not certain, but there are several theories, all of them pointing to the time of Shakespeare: (1) after a glass of wine was raised, and the words of honor spoken, each person dipped a piece of toast into his wine and ate it; (2) before the glasses of wine or ale were raised, a small piece of toast was put in the bottom of each to trap the dregs; (3) before the good wishes were spoken and the drinks drunk, a piece of spiced toast was placed in each glass to add flavor to the wine. The toast was first associated with the drink (a toast), then with the speech, then with the person proposing the toast (a toastmaster) and finally with the person being toasted (the toast of the town). The practice of touching (or ‘clicking’) glasses after a toast goes back to an ancient custom by which a host and a guest each poured a little wine into the other’s cup to ensure that if one had poisoned the other, they would both become toast (i.e., ‘die’). This may have been the inspiration for modern expressions such as The flooded town was toast’ (i.e., totally destroyed) and ‘They toasted her’ (i.e., killed off her character on the TV soap opera)."