Open your kitchen cupboard or a cookbook, and chances are you’ll come across a lot of spices and peppers with recognizable names that you still can’t pronounce properly, like turmeric, cayenne, and habanero. We often give foreign...
Imagine a time when heroin was marketed for the whole family. It really happened! Also, how Twitter, M&M’s, and Hallmark cards got their names. Plus, restaurant slang, bad juju, having a wild hair, cutting to the quick, and use vs. utilize.
A Dallas listener says he was confused at first when a friend from rural North Dakota reported coming home and finding a moose in his kitchen. Only later did he learn what difference the so-called Canadian raising of a vowel can make. More about...
kitchen n.— «Lobsters like the shelter of rocks and prefer cold water to warm. They move around a lot and find their food by smell—that’s what the antennas are for—and not by sight. But the whole notion of trapping them may be a...
parlor n.— «Lobsters like the shelter of rocks and prefer cold water to warm. They move around a lot and find their food by smell—that’s what the antennas are for—and not by sight. But the whole notion of trapping them may be a...
A Texas listener recounts an ongoing debate in her family’s kitchen over the exact definition of the word spatula. Is it the kitchen tool used to spread icing and level measuring cups? Something you use to flip a pancake? That item with the...

