Paris Hilton exposed, Natalie Bush looking cheeky. Since meat has become a central theme in the past week, I thought I'd bring the official NBA to the fore: yup, the National Bar-b-Que Association.
The etymology of BBQ has been a source of entertainment in the past, so here's a back-log BBQ story from Slate, and I need to try burying and roasting a sweet potato in hot coals.
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The etymology of BBQ is clear: it comes from barbaque, which in turn comes from berbec. Is there still about a debate about this settled matter?
For you philologists out there, I'll merely provide Professor William Craigie's, Dictionary of American English on Historical Principles, definition:
BARBECUE, n. [Sp. barbacoa, of Carib origin; in various parts of Central and South America the name of a wooden grid on which meat is dried or roasted, or which is used as a couch or sleeping place... the precise quarter from which the word was introduced into the Southern states is not clear.]
I suppose the bbq couch or sleeping place would've been more prolific in the cannibal regions of northern South America.
Let's see what JJ thinks...
Coanda invented the bbq pit. It was intended to be an airplane but the fuel system and engine worked better as a cooking device.
Here is another reference:
"La barbaque": Bad meat. Old slang word, the origins of which are uncertain. It may come from the Romanian word "berbec" = "lamb", that French soldiers brought back to France in 1855. But it may also be of Mexican-Caribbean origins, from the word "barbecue". Again, French soldiers didn't really appreciate meat cooked that way but they brought the word back from Mexico in 1862. Anyway, whatever the exact origins of this word, nowadays it means meat of very poor quality.
Hmmmm... Maybe if cooked by the French.
Now, I dunno about "Barbecued Barbarians and Their Barbers". Maybe something is lost in the translation from the German?
The Romanians had bad meats? Maybe cooked right it was nothing to Craiova.
Nothing like moonshine prune liquor in 2-liter plastic coke bottles to wash down bad meat.
Good stuff, I admit.
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