Thursday, February 26, 2009

Lost in Translation

A lot of the food items here in Mexico are "bilingual" in that they have both English and Spanish labels. It's always interesting to me to read the translations...I really got a kick out of this one!

Tostadas from Soriana (a large grocery store chain here)
...basically large corn chips.

English translation: "Yellow toast" Huh?

Then I noticed a recipe on the back for
"Tostadas de Tinga" (which are
very good, by the way...)

So here we go...
Tinga Toast
Ingredients:
1 boneless and skinless chicken breast (cooked and shredded)
1 big sliced onion
2 Soriana vegetable oil tsp.
1 smash tomatoe tbs. salt and chipotle
Directions:
In a pan, fry the onion,
add some thick soup (as in the tomato smash?)
with the chicken broth. When reaching
boiling point, add the chicken and chipotle.
Note: Pile the chicken mixture on top of the tostadas
and top with shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes,
sour cream, and/or salsa...
o con lo que te da la gana...
or with whatever toppings you like.
Enjoy with your toasts!


6 comments:

Unknown said...

I too LOVE reading the English translations of things. But here is where I cringe - now that I'm a little wiser in the ways of multiple languages - you HAVE to imagine that when things are translated in the U.S. from Spanish to English - how often we too probably make cringing mistakes like that as well. Ah well! At least we get to laugh! My daughter had an assignment for school in which she had to write out 6 "comics", complete with illustrations. We had to really think hard, because so many one-liners SERIOUSLY don't translate the same! It was hard! But fun!

Anonymous said...

That was hilarious!!!
Tasha

Rebecca Conduff Aguirre said...

Yeah, I have observed interesting translations to English...can't really remember anything specific off the top of my head, but I remember thinking that they needed to up the quality of the translation...wow, writing out comics would be hard, not just the words, but all the cultural nuances, etc.

Tasha, glad you liked it, thought you'd get a kick out of it, too! :) "yellow toast" evokes quite a different image than "tostadas" doesn't it?! LOL

Joy @ SAH Missionary said...

Hilarious! Yellow toast doesn't sound quite as yummy as tostadas...:) I see crazy English translations here too, I need to keep my eye out for a good one to share on my blog. :)
Thanks for the laugh!
Blessings,
Joy

Rebecca Conduff Aguirre said...

@Joy, yeah, do that! That would be interesting to see. :) Sometimes menus at restaurants have funny translations...I remember seeing "floor tortillas" on the menu here one time! We were like, hmmm...so how do they make those?!

Terri :o) said...

Now I'm starting to understand why we simply keep the original name. I'd much rather eat a Tostada than Yellow Toast. :o)