Tuesday, May 03, 2005

Crowfu, clafouti, and other tasty words

I claim the above neologism, meaning "tofu crow", useful for vegetarians eating their words. Too bad, pretenders.

In similar-sounding word news, I recently found myself unable to define what a clafouti is, beyond knowing it is traditionally made with cherries. Well, actually, I tried to say that it had dough on top like a cobbler. As it happens, that's not so far off according to this. But the moment called for a sharp definition. Read this if you wish to avoid a similar embarrassment. Amusingly, as the answer.com link shows, the word is derived from the French, and seems for some reason to have meant something like "stuffed with nails" (perhaps in a naughty sense of "stuffed"). They link to the word "footle", which I admit was new to me. It means "to screw around", though dictionaries don't allow themselves such felicitous locutions. Note that the dictionary does give as one of its definitions "trifle", which has as a secondary meaning another sort of dessert.

2 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

No, wait, What?
A clafouti - a pancake dressed up, with cream and fruit. Hey. Have a distraction drink, or six, first.
Clafouti - currently hip with peaches, plums, pears in season.

11/10/05 20:50  
Blogger rilkefan said...

Peaches, plums, and pears might be good in "distraction" drinks whatever the season...

11/10/05 23:43  

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