Cockney rhyming slang. The custom is that you take a two-word phrase whose second word rhymes with the target word, and then you just use the first word. So "P

Cockney rhyming slang. The custom is that you take a two-word phrase whose second word rhymes with the target word, and then you just use the first word. So "Plates of meat" == "feet", but you just say "me plates are cold". Scousers don't do that. [Edit] There was a cafe off Haymarket in London, called "My Old China". That was another kind of plate; a "china" is a "china plate", which rhymes with "mate". So it's "my old mate".