Tuesday, April 12, 2011

A History of Food Vocab

A History of Food by Maguelonne Toussaint-Samat

Pogrom: an organized massacre of helpless people; such a massacre of Jews

Awn: one of the slender bristles that terminate the glumes of the spikelet in some cereal and other grasses

Rachides: the elongated axis of an inflorescence (2) : an extension of the petiole of a compound leaf that bears the leaflets

(aside)Inflorescence: the mode of development and arrangement of FLOWERS on an axis

Ruminant: an animal (such as a cow or sheep) that has more than one stomach and that swallows food and then brings it back up again to continue chewing it

Potation: a usually alcoholic drink or brew

Panicle: a pyramidal loosely branched flower cluster

Pergola: a structure usually consisting of parallel colonnades supporting an open roof of girders and cross rafters

Spatchcock: To prepare (a dressed chicken) for grilling by splitting open

Escalope: scallop

Flageolet: a small fipple flute resembling the treble recorder

Umbelliferous: of or relating to the carrot family

Coprophagous: feeding on dung

Bastinado: a blow with a stick or cudgel

Seraglio: a palace of a sultan

Batrachian: amphibian

Espalier: a plant (as a fruit TREE) trained to grow flat against a support (as a wall)

Febrifuge: an agent that reduces fever

Garum: a type of fermented fish sauce condiment that was an essential flavour in Ancient Roman cooking

Parthenogenesis: reproduction by development of an unfertilized usually female gamete that occurs especially among lower plants and invertebrate animals

Metonymy: a figure of speech consisting of the use of the name of one thing for that of another of which it is an attribute or with which it is associated (as “crown” in “lands belonging to the crown”)