Monday, December 10, 2007

I Before E Except After C

Why is it that some food terms are consistently mispronounced and/or misspelled? I mean, I can understand small children pronouncing spaghetti as "pisketti" - they usually grow out of that sort of thing fairly early. But adults...grrrr! Here are a few that I see or hear on a regular basis, and which annoy me as often.

Carmel is a town in California, not a chemical reaction that occurs when sugars are heated. The correct term is CARAMEL. And CARAMELIZED. There's an extra syllable in there that you carmelizers skip. Do use it next time.

CHIPOTLE - chee po tlay. NOT "chi pol tay" or "chil pol tay." Or, as Bobby Flay pronounces it, "chee po til lay." Do you say "Mc Donlads" too??

That luscious sweet cheese in tiramisu is MASCARPONE, not MARSCAPONE. How's this, boobs - MASCAR like...NASCAR!

Do you have any food language peeves? Let me know in the comments!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ohhhh, dude, the "Chipotle" one annoys me every. single. time.

What about "nucular"? Oh wait, that's not food-related. Whoops.

I don't like it when people pronounce "hummus" like "humus". It's not forest-floor compost, people.

(the mascarpone one I didn't know. thanks!)

Anonymous said...

OOH! I thought of another! Pecan. It's "puh-con". Not "pee-can" or "pee-con".

Puh. Con.

kthxbye.

Anonymous said...

Bruschetta.

It's pronounced "broosketta," not "brooshetta." Just like "chianti" is not pronounced "sheeantee."