Quinoa
Beyond subsistence, what's the point of quinoa in a modern diet? It doesn't taste of anything, let alone anything interesting, and you can't eat it with a fork. If flavours were colours, it would be something inoffensive and dull, like beige or pale-to-mid grey. Yet restaurants, bistros, and supermarkets insist on including it in salads, where all that it adds is bulk.
Of course, much the same could be said of couscous and bulgur, which I love. But what I absolutely bloody hate about quinoa is that it's pronounced /ˈkiːnwɑː/ (kee·nwah
). Given the spelling, it sounds like an affectation.
It reminds me of the gentrification of London during the '80s–'90s when—so the story goes—the yuppies who couldn't afford to live in Kensington and Chelsea changed the pronunciation of boroughs that they could afford to live in, to something less…common
. Streatham became saint·reath·ham
; Clapham became klahm
; and Cockfosters became co·foh·sters
. I have no idea whether this is true or just urban myth, but it certainly fits the stereotype that I came across in London around that time. And I bet they're all over quinoa like flies on poop now.
According to Wackypeedeeyah, another accepted pronunciation is /kɪˈnoʊ.ə/ (kee·no·ah
), which I'd not come across before now. Given that the word quinoa comes from the Quechua kinwa or kinuwa—which make a hell of a lot more sense in relation to the accepted pronunciations—why not spell it like that?
Since I'm a grumpy old man, and I want none of this pretentiousness, I shall continue to pronounce quinoa as I see it phonetically, /ˈkwɪn.oʊ.ə/ (kwin·oh·ah
). I don't care if people think that I'm wrong, because I think they're wrong.
Whatever, it still tastes of bland.