benhall.1 wrote:Nanohedron wrote:Most of the time if we're not being specific, be they fresh or dried, we're just going to say "peppers".
In my experience, we would never say "peppers" for anything other than sweet peppers. If we mean the hot kind, then we would say either "chillis" or "chilli peppers", never just "peppers".
Yes, I knew a Scot who made the same distinctions. The US tendency doesn't. We start vague as hell, and proceed from there. In fact, we might be a bit just the opposite: If someone said they were going to throw some peppers in a stew, my first assumption would be chilis. I think we're more likely to specify bell peppers as such (which is how I normally say "sweet peppers") and less so when "peppers" means chilis. TBH, I seldom if ever use the word "chilis"; I might say "hot peppers", but it's more likely going to be just "peppers". Likewise, if I put red bell peppers in something I cooked and was enumerating the ingredients to someone, I would definitely say "red bell peppers", not just "peppers". Even "red peppers" is too ambiguous, to me. The one exception would be "green peppers": where I live, it invariably means green bell peppers.
benhall.1 wrote:In my experience, people - and recipes - say coriander, and the meaning is perfectly clear. I have never seen the need to distinguish coriander (meaning seeds) from coriander (meaning leaves).
You know what I think? I think you've either just been fantastically lucky, or you take bizarre to be "exotic".
benhall.1 wrote:By the way, o-REG-a-no is an abomination. It's pronounced orrig-AH-no.
Ah, but it comes to us from the Spanish "orégano" (note the stress accent), so who's doing the abominating, here? Consider yourself pounced upon.
benhall.1 wrote:Meanwhile, the one, staying in this culinary area, that really bugs me is the American pronunciation of "Errbs". I just don't get it. It's linguistically completely incorrect, being neither French nor English.
I'm going to differ with you again. Originally Latin, surely it must come to us from the French.
benhall.1 wrote:It's pronounced "herbs", i.e. with an "h" on the beginning.
Occasionally you hear it that way in the States, but it's definitely a minority (numbers, not ethnicity) pronunciation. I've generally assumed it to be more of an East Coast phenomenon, but I don't know how much merit the assumption has. When I was a child, I simply attributed it to poor education!
But now I know that education is not really a determining factor in these things: In Louisiana I encountered a plantation's historical guide who was very highly educated indeed, but still she pronounced "ask" as "axe". Jarring as I found the contrast, that's a regionalism, pure and simple.
benhall.1 wrote:Mind you - straying from the culinary - Americans are also responsible for the now pervasive mispronunciation of lingerie as "lonzh-er-ay" which is appalling. It should properly - obviously - be "lanzh-er-ee".
I agree it's appalling. And if that weren't bad enough, for "chaise longue" we say "chase lounge" (well, I don't; I just say "fainting couch"
).
Ah, well. At least we all pronounce "pilot" alike. Or so I hope. Please tell me no one pronounces it "pillut".
"If you take music out of this world, you will have nothing but a ball of fire." - Balochi musician