Grody Food Words

[As an introductory note, the word "grody" is in serious need of a comeback. It's too choice for us to allow it to be superseded by just "gross" or "disgusting." Grody takes revulsion to another level. As my sister Jen used to say, "grody to the maximum fluoride protection that toothpaste can give.]

So, there are a few words that people often use to describe food that I find really disgusting. Grody, even. Here's my list and why:

1. Meal

Just say the word out loud. Your mouth makes a horribly ugly motion as your cheeks spread wide to pronounce this word. When I hear it, I think of meal-worms. So, say the word and feel your cheeks fill up with writhing little maggot-like worms. Just the image I want as I'm thinking about eating. Yum. Can we get together for a meal soon?

2. Decadent

This word almost always shows up somewhere on the dessert menu, usually with something chocolate. Now, I like chocolate a lot, which is why I don't really want it to be decadent. The word is derived from the Latin decadentia, which implies death,decay , and decline - whether it's a dead body, a tooth with a cavity, or western civilization. Do you really want to eat a chocolate brownie that's in decline? "Thank you for your order, sir. This decadent brownie was really good about a month ago, but now it's gone bad and a bunch of meal-worms are hatching throughout its gooey insides."

Think of a dead animal on some freeway putrefying in the sun. Now that's decadent.

I know, I know. People use the word to imply the moral decadence that such luxurious hedonism as eating rich chocolate denotes. I get it. But, that's not really all that morally decadent. If you want to use the word metaphorically, try it on something applicable.

3. Chutney

It might be really tasty, but I think almost anything with the "-ut-" combination in it has negative implications. Butt. Slut. Gut. Hut. Mutt. There are some exceptions: I think "butter" sounds okay, and nuts can go either way (let's keep this PG-rated), but "chutney" falls in the ugly word category for me.

4. Drizzle

Drizzle is actually not a bad word. Unfortunately, I've only run across it in two contexts: to describe rain and to describe how some kind of sauce is applied to some dish. As a word for rain, I find it completely legitimate. It really means "spray" or a fine mist. When it's drizzling outside, the rain isn't falling very hard.

Too bad this isn't the way it's used in food preparation. Strawberry sauce "drizzled" on cheesecake usually means it's poured on in a zig-zaggy way. Tell me, chef-people. Have you ever seen it rain in zig-zags? The patterned pour, coupled with this word's rhyming with "whiz" makes me want to stay away. Anybody want some "whizzled" lemon sauce on their pound cake? (In a related note, Cheez Whiz is grody on so many levels.)

5. Savoury.

Okay, so this word isn't really gross. It's just that food-describers have misappropriated this word. There are multiple meanings, the most common being something that is very appetizing, agreeable, etc. Too bad this word has come to mean "things that are not sweet that we can serve at cocktail parties." So, by this definition, a chocolate chip cookie isn't "savoury," but by the most common understandings, chocolate chip cookies are (usually) amazingly savoury (appetizing).

This is a personal grudge for me because I am, as many of you know, a master crêpe maker. In English, crêpes are often divided into "sweet" and "savoury" categories. All of my crêpes are savoury, suckers.

It's probably gastronomically important to make this distinction, but, for pete's sake, can't someone come up with a different word? Like "salty"?

Anyone have any more grody or misused food words?