While in a cooking class in Mexico, Travis from Orlando, Florida, was told by the instructor that the word quesadilla comes a supposed Nahuatl word, quesaditzen. That’s not the case, although many other food words derive from that indigenous...
How colors got their names, and a strange way to write. The terms blue and orange arrived in English via French, so why didn’t we also adapt the French for black and white? • Not every example of writing goes in one direction across the page...
Cathy from San Antonio, Texas, notes that many Spanish words come from the Nahuatl language, including the words for “tomato,” “sweet potato,” and “avocado,” which are tomate, camote, and aguacate, respectively...
Is there a word or phrase that’s particular to your hometown? The editors of the Oxford English Dictionary would like to hear about it. In Cincinnati, for example, three-way refers to a kind of style of serving chili. You can contribute your...
Cumin, the earthy spice in many chili powders, has a dictionary pronunciation that surprises plenty of cooks: many dictionaries give a form that rhymes with comin’. Older spellings such as cummin help reinforce that, but everyday kitchen...
bowl of red
n.— «The fact that a Texas “bowl of red,” as chili is commonly called, has no original relationship with past didn’t matter.» —by Mark Busby The Southwest , 2004. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)