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'fries' vs 'french fries'
Hullow,
So I was at McDonald's and I said ' can I plz get french fries?' and she said 'sorry we only have fries' and I was like ..... ! is it 'french fries' or 'fries' in the US or in the UK ? fank you.
It's either, and no one actually says "freedom fries". That was a big piece of media nonsense.
I just call them "fries" as I always have. People rarely use the longer name "French fries"
Officially the word is "French fries." Many people working in fast food places today however are immigrants who learn only a street English. It's hard to believe that any native American doesn't know what "French fries" means but this may be possible too in a country where sadly, the middle class is shrinking and literacy and educational levels are shrinking along with it.
<<Officially the word is "French fries." Many people working in fast food places today however are immigrants who learn only a street English.>>
I'm not an immigrant and I never say "French fries." <<It's hard to believe that any native American>> ?? You're using confusing terminology. How about "native-born American?" <<doesn't know what "French fries" means but this may be possible too in a country where sadly, the middle class is shrinking and literacy and educational levels are shrinking along with it.>> Whether or not that's true has nothing to do with people using a shorter name for a food item.
<<It's hard to believe that any native American doesn't know what "French fries" means but this may be possible too in a country where sadly, the middle class is shrinking and literacy and educational levels are shrinking along with it.>>
American Indians don't know what "French fries" means? They must lead very traditional lifestyles. I say "Fries"; I didn't know that made me illiterate and uneducated. "French fries" sounds old-fashioned.
For me, "French fries" is just the full formal term for "fries", which is more informal; note that I do use both, rather than only using one or the other, unlike some here for whom "French fries" is apparently obsolescent.
Here in Hong Kong, everyone says "French fries" when referring to the fried potato strips sold in McDonalds.
"Fries" can be anything fried... and there's a lot of that stuff in Hong Kong!! Anyone wants fried rice (flied lice) or chow mein? ;) Oddly, even though HK was previously under British rule, the word "chips" has never caught on except in the phrase "fish and chips". So, the little strips at McD's are invariably "French fries" here.
And yeah, how odd, I never thought of "French fries" as a formal term. It's just common usage for me.
Can most non-Americans, non-Britons say the same?
(Sorry for my three posts in a row. I'm a very fragmented thinker, lol.)
They're chips, and not just in the UK, although McDonald drones everywhere will probably lose their jobs if they don't use the NA term.
In Australia, until a few decades ago, the term "french fries" was used to describe thin but full-width-of-the-potato slices of the pomme du terre. A McDonald-style chip was called a potato straw. |