Why is it called a "hamburger" if it doesn't contain ham?
At first glance, it seems that the word "hamburger" is a combination of the words "ham" and "burger." Therefore, one naturally assumes that a hamburger is a burger that contains ham.
But the word "hamburger" actually traces its roots back to Hamburg Germany, where people used to eat a similar food called the "Hamburg steak." Eventually, the Hamburg steak made its way to the United States, where people shortened its name to "hamburger."
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There are many stories about the origin of the term hot dog, most of them false. First, let's start with what we know.
The first known use of the term is in the Yale Record of 19 Oct 1895, which contains the sentence:
They contentedly munched hot dogs during the whole service.
Two weeks earlier, that same paper recorded:
But I delight to bite the dog When placed inside the bun.
The hot is obvious, but why dog? It is a reference to the alleged contents of the sausage. The association of sausages and dog meat goes back quite a bit further. The term dog has been used as a synonym for sausage since at least 1884 and citations accusing sausage-makers of using dog meat date to at least 1845. So hot dog is simply an extension of the older use of dog to mean a sausage.
Perhaps the most persistent false story about the origins of hot dog is the one concerning sausage vendor Harry Stevens, cartoonist T.A. "Tad" Dorgan, and the Polo Grounds. According to myth, c. 1900 Stevens was selling the new type of snack at a New York Giants game. Dorgan recorded the event in a cartoon, labeling the sausages "hot dogs" because he didn't know how to spell "frankfurter." Other variants have Stevens naming the delicacy and Dorgan recording it. Unfortunately, the dates don't work. The incident at the Polo Grounds is alleged to have happened after the term was coined. Also no one has found the Dorgan cartoon in question. There is a 1906 Dorgan cartoon featuring hot dogs at a sporting event, but besides being even later, is from a bicycle race at Madison Square Garden, not a baseball game at the Polo Grounds.
The use of hot dog to mean skilled or proficient is unrelated to the sausage. In a bit of linguistic coincidence, this usage also appears in the 1890s. It first appears in 1894 in the sense of a well-dressed college student, a clothes horse. This usage is probably a variation on the older expression putting on the dog (1871, why dog is not known, but there is a well-established slang usage of dog meaning flashy or showy from the 1870s). It quickly moved from this sense of suave sartorial splendor to proficient, accomplished and eventually to its modern association with extreme sports and risky action.
I am indebted to word sleuth Barry Popik, who has conducted most of the relevant research on the origin of hot dog. Posts: 1500 | Registered: Dec 2005
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When I am in Ikea I always get 2. Mustard and ketchup................yummy...........they always remind me of Ikea.............Sweden..........
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But people who live in Hamburg are also called Hamburgers.Its like being in the twilight zone.
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I've seen them in the Supermarket, I was confused about the name.. it's a DOUGHNUT! Do you know why they call them that?
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I've seen them in the Supermarket, I was confused about the name.. it's a DOUGHNUT! Do you know why they call them that?
Here's what Wikipedia has to say: Doughnuts have a disputed history. One theory is that they were introduced into North America by Dutch settlers, who are responsible for popularizing other desserts, including cookies, cream pie, and cobbler.
Another story credits the invention of the doughnut hole to a Danish sea captain named Hanson Gregory. During a particularly violent storm, Gregory needed both hands free to man the wheel of his ship, and impaled a fried cake upon the wheel, creating the signature hole. The center of fried cakes were notorious for being undercooked, so the innovation stuck. By cooking fried cakes with the center hole, the surface area increased, and the doughnut cooked faster.
Another possible origin has the dessert's invention as part of the story of Hanukkah. Called sufganiyot, Jews make these pastries (and other oily foods like latkes) to remind them of the sacramental oil that was used to light the six-branched Menorah in the Temple.
Personally, I prefer the doughnut holes, much better Posts: 13440 | Registered: Feb 2006
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Any number of people have inquired about the origin of the name of this pastry. The dough part is easy enough, but why nut?
The term doughnut is first attested to 1809 in Washington Irving's Knickerbocker's History of New York. But Irving does not refer to the toroidal confection that we know today. Instead, what he describes are small balls of fried dough, what we would today call doughnut holes:
An enormous dish of balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog's fat, and called doughnuts, or olykoeks.
The nut comes from the size and shape of these balls, literally nut-like objects made out of dough.
Thoreau references oblong-shaped doughnuts, what we might today call a cruller, in an 1847 Atlantic Monthly article:
The window was . . . the size of an oblong doughnut, and about as opaque.
Apparently, the familiar torroidal shape did not become standard until the 20th century.
Some wags have claimed original spelling was "doughnought," referring to the hole in the middle. This is simply not true.
(Source: Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd Edition)
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This phrase meaning suddenly, without preparation or to speak frankly is originally a reference to food. Cold turkey is something that can be prepared quickly and with little effort.
The earliest known usage is from 1910 in Robert Service's Trail of '98:
I'd lost five thousand dollars . . . "cold turkey."
The sense meaning to speak frankly dates to at least 1920 in a citation from T.A. Dorgan:
Now tell me on the square–can I get by with this for the wedding–don't string me–tell me cold turkey.
The sense meaning to quit an addictive substance suddenly is from at least 1921, when it appears in the Daily Colonist of Victoria, British Columbia on 13 October:
Perhaps the most pitiful figures who have appeared before Dr. Carleton Simon . . . are those who voluntarily surrender themselves. When they go before him, they are given what is called the "cold turkey" treatment.
There is an explanation that the pasty, goosebumped skin of an addict going through withdrawal resembles cold turkey skin and this gave rise to the term. But this is not borne out by the fact that the addiction sense is a later one.
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ROFL tooti you're great. I used to have a book that had all kinds of western type phrases and why we say them and where they originated. One I remembered was 'Chew the Fat'. Apparently way back when, people had a limited amount of food (especially meat) and when the weather was cold, they would gather around the indoor fire places which they also used to cook food with the kettle, they would chew the fat from the food (considered tasty) and sit and talk. That's where it came from Posts: 13440 | Registered: Feb 2006
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quote:Originally posted by NotSleeplessInCairo: I've seen them in the Supermarket, I was confused about the name.. it's a DOUGHNUT! Do you know why they call them that?
They are actually called Berliner Krapfen (= doughnuts from Berlin), thus the name.
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99% of america origin is from somewhere else in the world. budwiser they stole that to. after second world war they took all the rich germans and the very clever guy whom invented the bomb
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AND THE SAME AS MAC DONALDS.WAS CALLED MICK AND MACS THEY JUST STARTED SELLING ICE CREAM.
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Internet lore (and perhaps folklore prior to the internet) has the origin of this word as lynching party for blacks in the American South, originally deriving from the phrase pick an nigger. This is absolutely incorrect. The word's origins have no racial overtones whatsoever.
In actuality, the word derives from the French pique-nique, meaning the same thing as it does in English--an outing that includes food. Pique is either a reference to a leisurely style of eating (as in "pick at your food") or it's a reference to selective delicacies chosen for the outing. Nique is a nonsense syllable chosen to rhyme. The word appears in English as early as 1748 in reference to picnics in Germany. The word did not gain widespread use in Britain until c. 1800
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This term has been around since 1610. It originally meant a well-fed servant. The more famous use in reference to the Yeoman of the Guard of the English royal household and later to the Warders of the Tower of London dates to 1671. Beefeater is quite literal, being a reference to the diets of well-off and spoiled servants. It contrasts with loaf-eater, a reference to a servant who eats the bread provided by his master, a term that dates back to Old English, hláfæta.
It is often incorrectly postulated the term comes from a supposed French word, buffetier. This alleged root, which would mean one who eats from a buffet, does not exist. Sometimes the word beaufet is presented as a transitional form, but this is simply a 17th century alternative spelling of buffet, much later than beefeater.
(Source: Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd Edition)
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