Fancy a Soupe à l'Oignon?

Do you know what Vichyssoise means? 10 exotic dishes’ names explained

Image: Sam Loyd

Whenever browsing through the menu of a foreign restaurant, the names can make food appear exotic, fancy, enticing, or straight-out odd. In these cases, the logic dictates that we ask the waiter for help. But a few of these foreign dishes have become famous all over the world and their names pop up in all sorts of restaurants, not just foreign ones. Take a look at the following ten and see if you already know the meaning of any of them!

Image: Philippe Murray-Pietsch

A staple name when it comes to "fancy" meals, Coq au Vin is French for rooster in wine, even if the rooster is usually replaced with chicken. Coq au Vin was a peasant dish in origin due to the fact that rooster meat is tough and sinewy and it takes a long time to marinate and braise to make the meat tender.

As legend goes, this dish originated during the Roman conquest of Gaul. The rooster was a symbol of valor to the Gauls. The chief of the tribe Arverne sent a symbolic rooster to Julius Caesar to show they would never be defeated. Caesar returned this gesture with a surprising twist, serving the chief with a delicious dish of rooster in wine.

Image: Mgg Vitchakorn

A literal translation of "spring pasta", Pasta Primavera certainly sounds Italian. But this dish originated in 70s America, not Italy. Sirio Maccioni, the co-owner of New York restaurant Le Cirque, initially introduced pasta primavera as an off-menu special.

Maccioni is said to have taken a dish of pasta, vegetables, and cream his wife had mixed from a hunger-induced raid of their kitchen, refined it, and started serving it to his guests. Despite its humble beginnings, pasta primavera gained huge popularity amongst diners and critics, eventually being adopted by home cooks in America and beyond.

Image: Bakd&Raw by Karolin Baitinger

Just pronouncing the name of this dish sounds like speaking French. Vichyssoise is a soup made of cooked and mashed leeks, potatoes, onions, and cream, served chilled and garnished with chopped chives. It was invented in the early 20th century by Louis Diat, a cook working as head chef of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in New York.

Leek and potato soup is a traditional staple of French cuisine. 19th-century French cookbooks give recipes for a simple leek and potato soup, called potage Parmentier or potage à la Parmentier. The name Vichyssoise means "ice-cold cream from Vichy".

Image: Toa Heftiba

A familiar yet exotic name, Chicken Tikka Masala is a dish consisting of roasted marinated chicken chunks in a spiced sauce, often creamy and orange-colored. The dish was created by cooks from South Asia living in Great Britain and is popular in restaurants around the world.

The sauce usually includes tomatoes, cream, coconut cream, and a masala spice mix. The sauce and chicken pieces may be colored orange using foodstuffs such as turmeric, paprika, tomato purée, or food dye. Tikka translates to "roasted", and Massala is "a mix of spices".

Image: Becca Tapert

Moussaka is an eggplant or potato-based dish, often including ground meat, which is common in the Balkans and the Middle East, with many local and regional variations.

Many versions have a top layer made of custard or béchamel sauce.

In Greece, the dish is layered and typically served hot. There’s a vegan version that replaces meat with mushrooms or a mix of sautéed onions and rice. And, in Turkey, moussaka consists of thinly sliced and fried eggplant served in a tomato-based meat sauce, warm or at room temperature. The word moussaka itself translates to "cold, or dipped in liquid".

Image: silvia trigo

Ceviche is a Peruvian dish consisting of fish or shellfish marinated in citrus and seasonings. The fish is usually cured in lemon or sour lime juice, marinated together with sliced or chopped onion, and served with chopped cilantro. The dressing also includes some local varieties of chili pepper or chili, replaced by mustard in some locations in Central America.

In Peru, it is served with garnishes of boiled root vegetables such as sweet potatoes, cassava, or, very rarely, potatoes, and grains or seeds such as corn, legumes such as zarandaja, fried plantain, seaweed, and lettuce.

Image: Mulan Sukrisno

A colorful array of small Chinese dishes traditionally consumed for brunch, Dim Sum is commonly associated with Cantonese cuisine. In the 10th century, travelers frequented Cantonese teahouses for small-portion meals with tea. Cantonese dim sum was originally based on local foods. As dim sum continued to develop, chefs introduced influences and traditions from other regions of China.

Dim Sum has a very broad range of flavors, textures, cooking styles, and ingredients and can be classified into regular items, seasonal offerings, weekly specials, banquet dishes, holiday dishes, house signature dishes, and travel-friendly items, as well as breakfast or lunch foods and late-night snacks. The term Dim Sum translates to "touch the heart."

Image: Viktor Ritsvall

Doner kebab is a dish of Turkish origin made of seasoned meat stacked in the shape of an inverted cone, turned slowly on the rotisserie, next to a vertical cooking element. The operator uses a knife to slice thin shavings from the outer layer of the meat as it cooks.

The sliced meat of a doner kebab may be served on a plate with various accompaniments, stuffed into bread as a sandwich, or wrapped in a thin flatbread such as filo. Doner kebab has become popular around the world as a fast food dish sold by kebab shops, and is often called simply a "kebab." The term, donner kebab itself, translates to "roasted lamb."

Image: Alyssa Kowalski

An exotic dish that has become famous all over the world, Pad Thai is a rice noodle dish fried in a wok and commonly served as a street food. As Thailand's national dish, it is typically made with rice noodles, shrimp, peanuts, scrambled eggs, and bean sprouts.

Many of the ingredients on a Pad Thai dish are provided on the side as condiments, such as red chili pepper, lime wedges, roasted peanuts, bean sprouts, garlic chives, and other miscellaneous fresh vegetables. The term Pad translates to "fried".

Image: Bakd&Raw by Karolin Baitinger

Wiener schnitzel is made of a thin, breaded, pan-fried veal cutlet served without sauce.

It is one of the best-known specialties of Viennese cuisine and one of the national dishes of Austria.

This dish is prepared from veal slices, butterfly cut, lightly pounded flat, slightly salted, and rolled in flour, whipped eggs, and bread crumbs. Finally, the Schnitzel is fried until it is golden yellow. The term Wiener schnitzel translates, literally to "small, breaded, veal cutlet."

SHINING FACTS

Ten Mind-Blowing Facts About Light That Will Illuminate Your Mind

Image: Tim Mossholder

Without light, there would be nothing - or at least we wouldn’t be able to tell the difference. A form of electromagnetic radiation that we evolved to perceive through our eyes, light is as mysterious a phenomenon as it is universal.

Delve with us into these 10 intriguing facts about light that will enlighten your mind and spark your curiosity.

Image: Mathew Schwartz

Light constantly refuses to behave as we expect it to. Defying classification, it can exhibit characteristics of both particles and waves, a concept known as wave-particle duality. The famous double-slit experiment is one of the best demonstrations of this weird phenomenon, which seems to challenge our understanding of the fundamental nature of our reality.

Image: NASA/Marshall Space Flight Center, Public domain

Light sails are devices that harness the power of photons from sunlight or directed lasers to propel spacecraft. These sails utilize the momentum generated by photons striking their reflective surfaces, providing a potential means for interstellar travel without the need for conventional fuel. Although the phenomenon was known for centuries - even Johannes Kepler suggested that it could be exploited to navigate the void of space - it was successfully demonstrated for the first time in 2010 by the IKAROS experimental spacecraft.

Image: Artem Bryzgalov

Lasers, short for "Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation," are concentrated beams of coherent light with numerous practical applications. From cutting-edge technologies like laser surgery and laser printing to everyday devices like barcode scanners and DVD players, lasers have revolutionized various industries since their invention in the 60s.

Image: Kaleb Nimz

While the speed of light in a vacuum (about 186,282 miles per second) is considered a universal physical constant, it can still vary wildly when passing through different mediums. For instance, light slows down when passing through transparent substances such as water or glass, which is why objects underwater appear distorted.

Image: Joshua Harris

When light interacts with matter, it can be absorbed, causing the material to heat up. However, some materials can also emit some of this residual energy as light when excited by an external energy source. This phenomenon, known as fluorescence, is observed in all sorts of natural materials and even in some living organisms.

Image: Thanh Nguyen

Cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB) is the oldest light in the universe, dating back to just 380,000 years after the Big Bang. While you can't see the CMB with your naked eye, its faint glow permeates the cosmos and provides crucial insights into the early universe's structure and composition. To appreciate it, scientists have to tune into the microwave part of the electromagnetic spectrum.

Image: Lawrence Chismorie

Light is extensively used in medicine, and for a wide range of applications. Phototherapy, the therapeutic use of light, has been employed for centuries to treat various medical conditions. From UV light for skin disorders to laser therapy for surgical procedures, light-based treatments are way more common than you would think.

Image: Bjschellenberg, CC BY-SA 4.0

Optical trapping, or laser tweezers, is a technique that uses super-focused laser beams to trap and manipulate microscopic particles. This groundbreaking method has a myriad of applications in both physics and biological research, allowing scientists to study individual cells or molecules with unprecedented precision.

Image: Ethan Robertson

Polarized light waves vibrate in a specific orientation, filtering out light waves oscillating in other directions. This property is harnessed in polarized sunglasses to reduce glare and improve visibility. Additionally, polarized light plays a vital role in technologies such as liquid crystal displays (LCDs), and can be even used for orientation in navigation. In fact, some researchers believe that Vikings made use of a polarizing device (a "sunstone") to find the location of the sun even in a completely overcast sky.

Image: Denny Müller

Where would we be without optical fiber? Not on the Internet, most likely. These flexible strands of glass or plastic allow us to transmit light signals over long distances with minimal loss of signal quality, and they form the backbone of modern telecommunications networks, allowing for rapid and efficient communication across the globe. Also, optical fibers play a crucial role in medical imaging techniques like endoscopy, providing minimally invasive means of visualizing internal structures within the human body.