Food Name Redundancies

Posted by LoCo, October 20, 2008 at 4:42 PM

Although I do realize that many not true redundancies, because they are used to distinguish the exact type of a thing, they still crack me up. What type of fish? Tuna fish! A few others that come to mind…

• Cheese quesadilla. It's just a quesadilla, a little quesada. Queso=cheese, –ada=–ful, and –illa=small. Obviously it's meant to distinguish a plain (or real) quesadilla (tortilla filled with cheese) from the now ubiquitous gringo-ized versions (e.g., chicken and bean quesadilla), but seeing it on a menu always makes me cringe.
• Shortbread cookies. I know it’s meant to describe the exact type of cookie, but shortbread is shortbread is shortbread. The word cookie isn’t even necessary, okay?
• Chai tea. Chai means tea. I know that many Americans think chai is a specific spiced tea drink (actually masala chai) but do the coffee houses have to perpetuate this error by listing chai tea latte (tea tea milk) on their menu boards?
• With au jus. Since au jus means with juice or in its juices, the word “with” is not needed. I know in the US we actually use the entire term “au jus” as a noun, as in, “Please put the au jus on the side”, but still…
• Real horseradish. Okay. It’s not actually a redundancy. But please. Is there fake horseradish out there? Without fail, when I request plain or pure horseradish (i.e., not creamed), the server responds, “So you want the ‘real’ horseradish, right?” Oh jeez.

Feel free to list the others I missed…

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