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A joke goes like this: A friend at work had an unusual dental related problem recently. About a month ago he had to have a small steel plate inserted in his mouth. A week later he noticed the plate was starting to rust. The dentist asked him if he had a change in his eating or drinking habits that may have caused the problem. My friend explained that he had tried hollandaise sauce for the first time recently and liked it so much he put it on everything. The dentist advised that the solution was to remove the steel plate and replace it with a chrome plate. When my friend asked why chrome the dentist replied, "There is no plate like chrome for the hollandaise!"

What does the punch line mean, and why is it funny?

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  • This forum is ill-suited for questions like this.
    – GEdgar
    Dec 17, 2011 at 21:56
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    @GEdgar: First, according to TPTB, this is not a forum. Second, "questions like this" are, like it or not, the province of English language and usage, no matter what some people may decide at any given time.
    – Robusto
    Jan 10, 2012 at 20:50
  • I'm with you, @Rob. Voting to reopen.
    – Kit Z. Fox ♦
    Jan 10, 2012 at 20:59
  • This answer can be explained with the word pronunciation; it is better than a joke where the explanation requires to know something about the culture.
    – apaderno
    Jan 11, 2012 at 19:42

1 Answer 1

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It's a pun. "There is no plate like chrome for the hollandaise" sounds like "There is no place like home for the holidays".

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    The implication probably being that either the plate in his mouth, or the fact that it was rusting, would make him speak funny and mispronounce the sentence if the friend were to say it. The dentist was mimicking or mocking the friend.
    – Joost Schuur
    Dec 22, 2010 at 13:45
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    @Joost: There is no such implication. It's a shaggy dog story or Feghoot. (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shaggy_dog_story, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feghoot)
    – Potatoswatter
    Jan 31, 2011 at 5:16
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    I should add that "There's no place like home for the holidays" is an idiom, or at least a well-known song, so even though the words sound different (nobody would mistake "chrome" for "home") the overall phrase is easily recognized.
    – Mr. Shiny and New 安宇
    Jan 11, 2012 at 14:47
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    Especially if the one telling the joke sings the last phrase.
    – Wayne Werner
    May 10, 2016 at 21:05

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