humbum
n.— «Is there anybody left who knows about humbums from the Depression days?…Maybe it was two words: hum bums?…They were kind of like fritters, made of selvage bread-dough pieces and plopped into hot oil. There they sizzled, expanded, turned reddish-brown.…You could slaver them with butter or powdered sugar or jam.…Humbums were yumptious.…My lineage is part French, so maybe it’s a French thing? I have fancied an etymology from hommes bonnes. They often ended up looking like little fat men.» —“Anyone got the dope on humbums?” St. Paul Pioneer Press (Minn.) Feb. 15, 2005. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Emily in Halifax, Nova Scotia, is married to a native Dutch speaker, who points out that they buy groceries in a store, so why doesn’t grocery denote just one of those items and not the store where they’re sold? Originally, the French...
Mark in Bismarck, North Dakota, spent years as a sailor, and wonders about the term sea painter, meaning “a rope attached to a lifeboat.” Why painter? The word may derive from Middle French pendeur meaning “a kind of rope that...