pick and choose

Idioms and Phrases

Select with great care, as in John and Kate loved to go to the pastry shop, especially if they had time to pick and choose . Despite its redundancy ( pick and choose are synonyms), this phrase has survived since the 1400s.

Example Sentences

“I view us right now as we have at least eight starters,” Cronin said, “so I can pick and choose who I’m going to start, but during the game they’re all going to play.”

From Los Angeles Times

You can pick and choose and take what you can get—in fact, right now you should, because it’s the only thing keeping our hearts from atrophy.

From Slate

I pick and choose depending on how my taste buds go.

From Los Angeles Times

It takes so much time to sift through all your messy, likely disorganized files, to pick and choose the most important ones, to hook up and sync the external drive, and to transfer everything to that black box, which you’ll likely protect with some login credentials and stow away in some drawer.

From Slate

Meanwhile, she said the privatisation of bus services meant "operators have been allowed to pick and choose routes and services that put profit ahead of passengers".

From BBC

Related Words

• elect
• name
• prefer
• take