Table of contents
Spanish words are tricky to say – first of all, as with all languages, there are numerous regional variations of this language. Secondly there is a massive difference in pronunciation between Spain and in Latin America.
If you have any other words you aren’t sure of, don’t hesitate to ask about them.
1. Chorizo
Even worse, I have seen chefs on TV standing in a plaza in the middle of Spain getting it wrong. The genesis of the problem is in the way the word is usually mispronounced:
Choritzo – the wrong way 😳
Culprits can see that the Spanish ‘z’ does not go the way of the English ‘z’, which is a good start. Then they make a fatal error – they use Italian pronunciation on a Spanish word. In Italian the ‘z’ has a ‘ts’/ ‘ds’ sound – think of ‘pizza’.
If ‘chorizo’ were an Italian word, there would be no problem, but chorizo is not an Italian word at all. It is a Spanish word. And the Spanish ‘z’ sounds NOTHING like the Italian ‘z’.
Now it gets a little more complicated – bear with me. In Spain, ‘z’ sounds like the ‘th’ in ‘thin’. In Spanish speaking Latin American countries (i.e. every country except Brazil, where Portuguese is spoken) the ‘z’ is pronounced like the ‘s’ in ‘sit’. Always.
So if you are in Spain, you say:
tchoh/REE/thoh
and if you are in South America, you say:
tchoh/REE/soh
Both are correct.
* For full details on the difference between Spanish from Spain and Latin-American Spanish pronunciation, have a look at my Spanish Hints
2. Dulce De Leche
I was going to say that you see this one in the UK far more than in the USA, but it turns out I was wrong – Americans are just as likely to make this error as the British. It’s another example of using Italian pronunciation on Spanish words, and sounds like this:
DOHL/tchay dee LEH/tchay 😳
It gets worse. Instead of writing ‘dulce de leche’, many people write ‘dolce di leche’. If you write it this way, you have 2 languages in one term!!! To correctly pronounce ‘dulce de leche’:
in Spain you say:
DOOL/theh deh LEH/tcheh
and in South America you say:
DOOL/seh/ deh/LEH/tcheh
3. Quesadillas
When people get this one wrong, at worst it comes out:
kweh/sah/dill/ahs 😳
and at best it is pronounced ‘keh/sah/dill/ahs. The first thing you have to get right is this: it doesn’t matter whether you are in Spain itself, or in any other Spanish speaking country – double ‘ll’ is NEVER pronounced like an ‘l’. A single ‘l’ is pronounced just as in English, but ‘ll’ is not – ever, ever, ever. It is most usually pronounced like the ‘y‘ in ‘yes’, and this is all you have to remember.
The second thing you have to drum into your head is that in Spanish everywhere, ‘que’ and ‘qui’ are always pronounced ‘keh’ and ‘kee’. Think of ‘mosquito‘ which is a word we get from Spanish.
What this all boils down to, is that the correct way to say ‘quesadillas’ is:
keh/sah/DEE/yahs
Technically, if you want to be fully authentic, you should say ‘keh/sah/THEE/yahs‘. If enough people want to know why, I’ll write a separate blog post to explain – in the meantime, see my Spanish Hints for more details. I think ‘keh/sah/DEE/yahs‘ is more than adequate.
4. Tortillas
A lot of people get ‘tortillas’ right. The rest say:
tohr/TIL/lahs 😳
Remember, in Spanish a double ‘ll’ sounds like the English ‘y’, so you say:
tohr/TEE/yahs
5. Paella
While we are dealing with the double ‘ll’ we may as well drum it in with as many examples as I can think of. ‘Paella’ is most often mispronounced like this by English speakers:
pah/ehl/lah 😳
It’s exactly the same principle as before – ‘ll’ has a ‘y’ sound in Spanish, and so you say:
pah/EH/yah
By now you should be getting rather good at this :).
If you want more details about these words, the following are links to the howdoyousaythatword.com database:
Of course there are many more mispronounced Spanish Foodie words – watch out for the next edition. If you have any comments or questions, please go ahead and add them!