It’s Bake Off season, and that means it’s time to be bamboozled with technical culinary terms, many of them in a foreign tongue. We’re intrigued by some of the weird and wonderful language that comes out of The Great British Bake Off – no, we don’t mean when bakers accidentally drop their cakes on the floor! – and we wanted to share our favourite baking-related vocabulary…
Biscuit
Coming from French, this literally translates as ‘twice cooked’, i.e. harder than a cake.
![Chocolate chip cookies on linen napkin wooden table.](https://www.utalk.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/ThinkstockPhotos-187957173.jpg)
Marmite
Beware, it’s a false friend: the French meaning is a large cooking pot, which actually features on the Marmite logo.
Ganache
![IMG_4391](https://www.utalk.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/IMG_4391.jpg)
No prizes for guessing that this word comes from French too, but we’d be genuinely impressed if you could tell us the literal meaning: a jaw. We’re not sure what the connection is – can anyone tell us?
Cornetto
When you’re in Italy and in the mood for a delicious gelato, make sure not to slip into ’O Sole Mio mode and order a cornetto, as this will actually get you a croissant.
![croissant](https://www.utalk.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/croissant.png)
Hors d’oeuvre
We all know this phrase, but did you know it’s so called because it literally translates to ‘outside of the work’ – in other words, an extra to the meal?
Chef
You may have heard this word in German, but did you know that there it means a ‘boss’, not a ‘cook’?
![Asian female cooking with magic](https://www.utalk.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/ThinkstockPhotos-178813013.jpg)
Cuisine
Confusingly, in French this can mean both ‘cooking’ and ‘kitchen’: you make your cuisine in the cuisine.
Crème anglaise
Contestants are forever whipping up a quick crème anglaise in the Bake Off and it sounds ever so grand, but actually it just means custard – sorry for the anti-climax. To add insult to injury, anglaise (or English) is used in French to indicate a particularly plain style. Boo!
![Orange Creme Brulee](https://www.utalk.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/ThinkstockPhotos-460155743.jpg)
Crème pâtissière
Another Bake Off classic, sounding even more chic, but I’m afraid this also just means custard (albeit a thicker version of the anglaise).
Trifle
Far and away my favourite word in Italian, which bizarrely translates our beloved national pudding into ‘la zuppa inglese’ – English soup.
![Trifle cake](https://www.utalk.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/ThinkstockPhotos-511064545-1.jpg)
Bain-marie
– It’s a little off-putting to find that this French term comes from the Latin meaning ‘Mary’s bath’ – and we don’t mean Mary Berry! It’s actually named after the alchemist Maria Prophetissima, who invented it.
Let us know your favourite linguistically interesting baking terms. Meanwhile… Baaake!