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‘One panini, two paninis…’: the grammar of Italian culinary culture in Britain today

The appropriation and adaptation of Italian culinary terms in contemporary English, exploring their current usage

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 May 2013

Extract

I still recall, with a mixture of amusement and embarrassment, the time I took a visiting Italian friend to lunch in a café along London's Holloway Road. After studying the menu, he ordered a mozzarella and tomato panino – ‘so that'll be one panini for you’, jotted down the young woman behind the counter. My friend confirmed his choice by repeating it in a way that signified he could speak only for himself. And to make his point, he leaned somewhat on the singular -o of the ending, keen, I imagined, to avoid the kind of mix-up that leads to extra portions being brought to one's restaurant table in error. But to no avail: before proceeding to take his order, our waitress told my companion firmly, in an unmistakeably eastern European accent, that he would be having a ‘mozzarella and tomato panini’, and that was that.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

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References

Metro. 2009. ‘Gelatis are the new ice cream.’ 21 July. Online at <http://metro.co.uk/2009/07/21/gelatis-are-the-new-ice-creams-286958/> (Accessed May 1, 2012).+(Accessed+May+1,+2012).>Google Scholar