'Balut,' 'lambanog' most mispronounced local food, drink — study
MANILA, Philippines — Local street delicacy Balut and strong alcoholic beverage Lambanog are the most mispronounced food and beverage from the Philippines, according to a recent study.
Word game search engine and online assistant WordTips searched for international foods and drinks taken from food guide TasteAtlas on Forvo, a library of user-submitted pronunciation recordings, last August 2022.
WordTips found that the most mispronounced food in the world were Chorizo and Rioja, both with Spanish origins as the former is a smoked sausage while the latter is wine from the region of the same name.
Chorizo had a total of 22 millon listens on Forvo, way ahead of the second-placed Croissant from France with 2.9 million listens, while Rioja's 1.4 million listens pipped Brazil's Caipirinha by some 300,000 listens.
Closer to home, Balut had 12,000 listens on Forvo while Lambanog had 1,100 listens.
Related: Manilla? Philippine capital is most mispronounced city in the country, study says
Some delicacies local to several countries also figured high in the data such as the chickpea-based dip Hummus, which accummulated 79,000 listens for being mispronounced in Egypt, Iraq, Israel, Lebanon, Syria and Palestine.
Other examples are Dulce de leche (Argentina and Uruguay), Rakija (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, and Montenegro), Sarma (Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, and Kosovo), and Arepa (Colombia and Venezuela),
More mispronounced foods globally include the United Kingdom's Scones, the United States' Burger, Japan's Sushi, Italy's Gnocchi, and Mexico's Tortilla.
For mispronounced beverages, drinks such as France's Champagne, Germany's Jägermeister, Cuba's Mojito, Mexico's Tequila, Italy's Prosecco, and Japan's Matcha popped up in the data.
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