Burrito or tacos, guacamole or salsa, Mexican food has become central to modern American eating. Like Italian, Mexican Spanish has…
broccoli and brussel sprouts
Plants push up through the dirt and spawn their wild and unusual forms. That sprouting names a bunch of green…
biscuit and biscotti
To make biscotti you back a cookie loaf, then you slice it and bake it again. Making a biscuit is…
cake and cookie
Both cake and cookie come originally from the German cake word, kokon. That becomes the Dutch koek and little cake, koekje. When koek turns into cake,…
gyros to barbecue
If you went to a Turkish restaurant, you’d find a vertical spit of meat, slowly turning, roasting in public. The doner…
pine nuts to peanuts
Many nuts get their names of their trees. The pine nut comes from the pine tree. You can go deeper…
ketchup and mustard
Tomato ketchup or catsup is probably the most American condiment. It does not tip its hat to any of its origins,…
orange and satsuma
Like many nuts and some fruits, the origin of orange ends up with just the name for tree. In this…
broth and breads
A boiling liquid was the beginning of our broth. The root bhreue was to heat, boil, or bubble. It gives brew, bread…
apple and melon
The apple and melon were formally a catchall name for a many fruits. It was generic similar to how we might use…
the journal of gastroetymology 