Food Pronunciation Guide for the Dim-witted

[Katie Nell]

Okay, two for me:

Saveur? (I've been wondering about this one for a while... I took 4 years of French in high school, but this one has me stumped for some reason!)

Izakaya?

Edited August 2, 2006 by Katie Nell (log)

[Abra]

Emma - no-chee-no, second syllable emphasis.

Katie - sah-ver is the closest I can come in English phonetics with the emphasis on the second syllable; ee-za-kai-a with emphasis on the third syllable

rockandroller - if you're saying charcuterie in French, there's emphasis on the second and last syllables. In English people tend to pronounce it as you suggested, emphasis on the second syllable only.

Edited August 2, 2006 by Abra (log)

[Mooshmouse]

Saveur: If you pronounce "ere" like you do in the word "were", then saveur is prounounce sah-VERE (accent on last syllable as Abra noted).

Izakaya: It's a common word 'round these here parts as we have a plethora of izakaya restaurants in Vancouver. I've heard it pronounced EE-zuh-KAI-uh (primary accent on the third syllable, secondary accent on the first syllable).

[Katie Nell]

Katie - sah-ver is the closest I can come in English phonetics with the emphasis on the second syllable; ee-za-kai-a with emphasis on the third syllable

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Saveur:  If you pronounce "ere" like you do in the word "were", then saveur is prounounce sah-VERE (accent on last syllable as Abra noted).

Izakaya:  It's a common word 'round these here parts as we have a plethora of izakaya restaurants in Vancouver.  I've heard it pronounced EE-zuh-KAI-uh (primary accent on the third syllable, secondary accent on the first syllable).

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Good! That's exactly how I've been pronouncing them... guess I was smarter than I thunk! Mooshmouse... that's exactly why I was asking... don't want to look like an idiot at Guu with Garlic!!

[MollyB]

Hoping someone can help...is majadera pronounced "mahJAHderah", or "majaDERah"? Should I go to the Middle Eastern forum and ask there...?

...

Miriam

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I've never made this dish, but I was just reading this thread, and was inspired to go check my Arabic dictionary about this word. (This may have been covered already in the Middle East forum, but variations in Arabic transliteration spelling make it really hard to search for.) Interestingly, the word comes from the Arabic root related to having smallpox. So "mujaddarah" (or majaderah, or something like that - the Roman-alphabet spelling depends on the transliteration system--or lack thereof--that is used) essentially means "that which is pock-marked", as from smallpox.

Any Arabic words that start with "mu-", "mou-", "mo-" are usually nouns built off a verbal root, and the emphasis is generally on the syllable following the prefix. So your "mahJAHderah" above is closest to the correct pronunciation in terms of which syllable is emphasized. The pronunciation of the vowels is what would probably vary most among different Arabic-speaking countries. Someone up-thread mentioned "foul mudammas", and "mudammas" ("moo-DUM-muss") is the same kind of noun, built off the root meaning "to hide or disguise or to bury". Foul (pronounced "fool") means fava bean, in case you were wondering.

Enough etymological rambling ... I think I need to go find a recipe for mujaddarah and try it out!

[suseyblue]

Bump for 'Godeeva/Godivah'?

There must be some Continental Europeans here who know. (I'd call, but the potential horror of running into Eileen at customer service or other person equally rude is off-putting).

Susan B (also actually in FLA, at the moment. )

[freshherbs]

i love this thread. here is one that i butchered for a long time

quinoa. i pronounced it kin-oh-a. it is actually keen-wah.

[suseyblue]

Last call for Godeeeeeeeeva...

Please? It's seriously making me nuts.

[CharlotteM]

I've got one that's been bugging me for a while...pissaladière. How is it said...? Please. Don't laugh. Accent marks confuse me ALL the time.

[Kerry Beal]

I've got one that's been bugging me for a while...pissaladière.  How is it said...? Please. Don't laugh. Accent marks confuse me ALL the time.

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piss la dee air if I am not mistaen

[Abra]

Not quite, Kerry. It's pee-sah-lahd-yair. There's a light emphasis on the first and last syllables.

Although, seeing as you're Canadian, that might well be the Quebecois pronunciation.

Edited August 20, 2006 by Abra (log)

[ohev'ochel]

I've got one that's been bugging me for a while...pissaladière.  How is it said...? Please. Don't laugh. Accent marks confuse me ALL the time.

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piss la dee air if I am not mistaen

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è is always pronounced EH short vowel [standard french]

and in jouale, the quebecois dialect [though i am not french canadian] this word would be pronounced pee-sah-lah-dee-YAY-r (they say yayr for -ière).

u need to hear it to understand the difference. emphasis is on the Y sound and not the I

quebecois french also has many variations when it comes to pronounciation -- depends where u come from.

Edited August 20, 2006 by ohev'ochel (log)

[kitchenmage]

è is always pronounced EH short vowel [standard french]

and in jouale, the quebecois dialect [though i am not french canadian] this word would be pronounced pee-sah-lah-dee-YAY-r  (they say yayr for -ière). 

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so wouldn't it be pee-sah-lah-dee-YAY-r eh?

(we really need a "ducks and runs" smilie icon!)

seriously, i like the rules so i can remember one thing that helps a lot instead of each word... i've got a friend who teaches french and a kid who calls toronto her home even though she's only visited there (and i've never been, so imagine my surprise!) so i'm really aware of my ignorant americanness when it comes to language... heck i know a 2.5 year old who knows american english, mandarin chinese, spanish and american sign (ASL)...

(we also need a "slinks away in shame" smilie... )

[ohev'ochel]

è is always pronounced EH short vowel [standard french]

and in jouale, the quebecois dialect [though i am not french canadian] this word would be pronounced pee-sah-lah-dee-YAY-r  (they say yayr for -ière). 

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so wouldn't it be pee-sah-lah-dee-YAY-r eh?

(we really need a "ducks and runs" smilie icon!)

seriously, i like the rules so i can remember one thing that helps a lot instead of each word... i've got a friend who teaches french and a kid who calls toronto her home even though she's only visited there (and i've never been, so imagine my surprise!) so i'm really aware of my ignorant americanness when it comes to language... heck i know a 2.5 year old who knows american english, mandarin chinese, spanish and american sign (ASL)...

(we also need a "slinks away in shame" smilie... )

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as an aside...when my parents, who are both french speaking (and multi lingual) europeans, came to quebec they were in shock. it took them some time to get used to hearing quebecois. it is different in pronounciation and uses many of its own slang words.

french is much easier to learn than english and pretty much follows the same pronounciatian rules each time. english, as we all know, breaks all the rules.

this is why a forum like this is helpful for those who do not know the language.

[MarketStEl]

I got tripped up by "andouille" on Friday night.

The trivia quiz host asked me how it was pronounced, and I whispered into her ear, "an-DWEE."

Several of the contestants on stage at the time informed her after she said that that it was actually pronounced "an-DOO-ee."

A vous de discouter...

[MaxH]

Years ago, I made a call to order something from Godiva, & they pronounced it 'Godeeva'. I queried them, and they said, yes, that's it, everyone in the US [edit: and presumably Britain] just butchers it.  ...  Now I am having a friendly internet discussion, & someone called the website phone number to confirm this ... and they were told, quote: that if someone was pronouncing it that way ['Godeeva'] they didn't deserve to eat any!

Maybe what's really needed here (and for variations of this situation that recur all the time, especially but not exclusively in the US) is an Index of Affected Marketing Pronunciations (IAMP for short). You know what I mean. Synthetic company names (overwrought by expensive consultants, with contrived image "positioning" in mind) that need days of practice, or indoctrination, in order to pronounce. Use of punctuation or accents to achieve a highly artificial result. Celebrities with commonplace given names that they then insist on pronouncing abnormally after they're celebrities (and therefore putatively less commonplace).

A separate point but along related lines: In late 2000 at the peak of the dot-com boom, after reading too many gobbledygook Mission Statements and buzzword advertisements by start-up vaporware firms (spending investors' money in great style, and even boasting about it), I promulgated a High-Tech Startup Horsesh*t Index or HTSHI. The HTSHI derives from a classic mathematical information measure (the Hamming distance). In fact, I was able briefly to discuss the idea with the late R. W. Hamming while he was still alive. The HTSHI calculates a score, for a given chunk of writing, based on how many (and how bad) are the hackneyed buzzwords ("paradigm," "total enterprise space," etc.). This, by the way, resonated with some high-tech people who eagerly added to the working list of buzzwords and weights. (Including one friend whose own high-tech firm has an artificial name no normal person can pronounce.)

But high-tech-startup doubletalk is a small and specialized genre of baloney. The creator of a successful, crisp absurdity measure for affected pronunciations intended to "sell" things would do a service to mankind.