Cookie Monster refers to several artists: a Muppet character and a punk band. Cookie Monster is a fictional Muppet character on the children's television show Sesame Street. He is best known for his voracious appetite and his famous eating phrases: "Me want cookie!", "Me eat cookie!", and "Om nom nom nom" (said through a mouthful of food). He often eats anything and everything, including danishes, donuts, lettuce, apples, bananas, as well as normally inedible objects such as salt and pepper shakers, signs, napkins, pencils, typewriters, telephones, motorcycles, Peabody Awards, trucks, a safe and the four letters in the word "food". Rarely does he digest the food, because he eats too fast and crumbs just fly around his face. As evidenced by his name, however, his preferred food is cookies. Chocolate chip cookies are his favorite kind; oatmeal cookies are his second favorite. The Cookie Monster's eating habits have been linked to the increase of childhood obesity in the United States. Since Sesame Street came on air in 1969, American rates of obesity for third graders has increased 5,000%. In a song in 2004, Cookie Monster revealed that, before he ate his first cookie, he believes his name was Sid. Showing awareness of healthy eating habits for children, since 2006 he has said that cookies are "a sometimes food" and that he also likes fruits and eggplant. However, an expose by "60 minutes" in August 2009 revealed that Cookie Monster only ate cookies at home, and he did not eat fruit and eggplant despite promoting the food to American and Mexican children. 1967 United States
