RATATOUILLE
Pronunciation: rah-tê-TWEE, rah-tê-TU-ee
Hear it!
Part of Speech: Noun, mass (no plural)
Meaning: A vegetable stew, originating in Nice, consisting of
eggplant, zucchini, tomatoes, peppers, and onions, prepared in
or with olive oil. RECIPE HERE.
Notes: French borrowings that have not been assimilated
into English usually sound beautiful to English ears. Today's
Good Word, however, sounds a little facetious due to its similarity
to 'rat-a-tat-tat', the onomatopoetic word for the sound of a
machine gun. So facetious it is, in fact, that the Disney Corporation
is using this word as the title of its recent feature cartoon
that attempts to extend the cuteness of Mickey Mouse to rats.
(Wonder why Walt himself preferred mice?)
In Play: This word is arcane enough that the subtitle of the
Disney film is a pronunciation guide for the title: 'RATATOUILLE (Rat-a-too-ee)'. However, the dish is delicious
when properly created, so its name should be more popular: "If
you aren't busy tonight, why not pop over to my place and I'll
throw a little ratatouille together."
Word History: Today's Good Word is a blend of French ratouiller
"to disturb, shake" and tatouiller "to stir". 'Tatouiller' is
a repetitive alteration of touiller "to stir, mix", the descendant
of Latin 'tudiculare', a verb built up from 'tudicula', a machine
for bruising olives. Tudicula is the diminutive of tudes "hammer"
that means "a small hammer". The same French 'touiller' was allured
into English some centuries ago to toil away as the English word
'toil'.
