Do not mispronounce this!

It's Canada Day! Let us look at a Canadianism and how to pronounce it. 

This is "poutine":

Poutine. Do not pronounce like...

I will understand if you non-Canadians are mystified by the ingredients, which are french fries, cheese curds, and gravy. (Acadians in the Maritime Provinces have another kind of poutine, which is a dumpling made of grated and mashed potatoes with pork in the middle. Theirs is the older version of "poutine".)  Even my devotion to real-world research for the Canadian Oxford Dictionary could not persuade me to sample the Quebecois poutine, but it is quite popular with Canadians. 

The ultimate origin of this word beyond Canadian French is uncertain. It is probably derived from various similar words in many French dialects, and influenced by the English word "pudding" (which has a fairly disgusting etymology we'll get into some other time).

The story behind the concoction is that Fernand Lachance, a snack bar owner in Warwick, Quebec (pronounced WAR wick, by the way), when asked by a customer in 1957 to combine fries and cheese in a bag, told him it would be a "maudite poutine" (a hell of  a mess).  But the combination and the word stuck, and made its way into Canadian English starting in the 1980s. You can now buy poutine at Burger Kings across Canada.  Apparently a poutine stand has also just opened at Disney World. Here's the "nutrition" information for a serving of poutine, should you wish to be flabbergasted (not to mention flabby, if you actually eat it):

• Calories 800

• Protein  30g

• Carbohydrates  68g

• Sugar  2g

• Fat  45g

• Saturated Fat  17g

• Trans Fat 1.5g

• Cholesterol  95mg

• Sodium 2860mg

Concerns about health aside, though, the really important thing is not to mispronounce this word. It is pronounced "pooTEEN". But many Canadians have vague memories from their school French lessons that consonants at the ends of French words are silent. (They are sometimes, but not when followed by an "e".) Armed with this little-learning-is-a-dangerous-thing, they bravely order "poo TANG" (with a nasal "a" vowel).

Unfortunately this sounds like the French word putain (whore), ultimately derived from the Latin putidus (stinking, rotten, fetid).

...Putain

Please do not order a putain when you are at Burger King!

Another entertaining thing about "poutine" is that in French, "Poutine" is also the spelling for Vladimir Putin's surname. It always cracks me up when I read headlines in Quebecois newspapers like "Le pari risqué de Poutine" (Putin's risky gamble).

Although maybe they were talking about the risky gamble of eating poutine!

un maudit Poutine

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