|
English UK
(UK to US in yellow) |
English US
(US to UK in blue) |
| Packed lunch |
Sack lunch, brown bag lunch |
| Pal (and another brand, Chum) |
Dog food |
| Pancakes | Crêpe- the thick, fluffy US item called
a pancake bears little resemblance to the UK version |
| Pancake Day | Shrove Tuesday, day before Ash Wednesday (same
day as Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday) eaten with sugar and lemon juice |
| Parkin | Type of cake |
| Paralytic |
Blind drunk (would be understandable in the US) |
| Parson’s nose |
Tail-bump of a cooked fowl (used in the US, although
uncommon- AKA the Pope's nose, also uncommon) |
| Pastille |
Small fruit candy, sometimes medicated. |
| Pasty (the 'a' pronounced as in cat) |
Meat or vegetable-filled pastries in the UK |
| Flat cake of chopped food
or mince (hamburger patty), flat boiled sweet (peppermint patty). |
Patty |
| Pawpaw |
Papaya. |
| Peanut butter and jelly
sandwich- most people use grape jelly (I prefer apple jelly) |
PBJ |
| Pease pudding, pease porridge | Baked split peas (originally the Carlin pea)
flavored with ham (and eggs). |
| Peckish |
Being a little hungry. 'I wouldn't mind a bite'
is about it. |
| A potato-cheese filled
dumpling. |
Perogi |
| Petit pois |
Small green peas (sometimes labelled that way
in US) |
| 1" waxy edible seeds of
western N. American pines. |
Pine nuts (there is also
an Italian version called 'pignoli' I think, which is probably the same thing,
only smaller) |
| Pint |
US pint is 16 oz, while English is 20 oz. A US
fluid ounce is 29.6 ml while an English oz. is 28.4ml. (So a pint of beer
is 473ml US and 568ml UK) |
| Pinta |
Pint of milk, from an ad ‘drinka pinta milka
day' |
| Plonk |
Cheap table wine. |
| Ploughman’s lunch |
Pub lunch consisting of hunk of bread and cheese
and a pint |
| Plover’s eggs |
Delicacy (?Not sure if this means the eggs are
a delicacy, or if the phrase means a delicacy) |
| Plum duff |
Steamed suet pudding with raisins, spotted dick
(Nothing like it in US) |
| Polo mint |
Strong mint candy - same shape as Lifesavers |
| Smaller or half keg. |
Pony keg |
| Pontefract cakes |
Flat round strong licorice candy, (originally
from Pontefract in Yorkshire) |
| Fruit pastry designed to
cook in a toaster, the kind with icing are frightening- what sort of icing
can go through a toaster and not melt? |
Pop Tarts |
| Strips of pork skin, rendered
of the fat as a snack (no, I wouldn't eat them) |
Pork Rinds/ Cracklins' |
| Porridge | Oatmeal (this is the cooked product, uncooked
would probably be called 'rolled oats') |
| Pot(h)een |
Strong illicitly made Irish liquor, from potatoes,
similar to moonshine, hooch, white lightning, white mule. |
| Produce |
Fruits and vegetables (used that way in US also) |
| Pub |
Bar (but more social/ family/ food than a US
bar) Pubs usu. have 2 sections: public bar (bar stools, sawdust on floor,
billiard tables, darts), & saloon bar (posher section, leather couches,
tables). It is not uncommon, esp. in less urban areas, to have a beer
garden. Hours are usually 11am - 3pm, then 5pm - 11pm. Pubs often have
quite substantial lunch menus. |
| Publican |
Pub proprietor |
| Custard-type desserts, in
various flavors |
Pudding |
| Pudding (Pud, colloquially) | Any dessert item or the dessert part of the
meal also savory dish such as pease pudding, steak and kidney pudding,
Yorkshire pudding. |
| Queen’s pudding |
Fancy bread pudding, baked with jam and meringue,
and can contain booze (similar to trifle but bread instead of sponge cake
and meringue instead of whipped cream). |
| Rapeseed oil |
Canola oil |
| Rat-arsed |
Drunk |
| Repeat |
Re-taste food as a result of burping or indigestion.
(Don't think US has a phrase to match-'coming back to haunt me' is the
closest & that may be a family phrase.) |
| Rock / Seaside rock | Originally a 12" long 1" thick, candy cane,
white with pink outside, found in the beach-side stalls of coastal tourist
towns with the name of the town embedded in clear red candy all the way
through its length, e.g. Southend rock, Brighton rock, Blackpool rock.Now
in various smaller sizes and colors swirled like candy canes. |
| Rock-eel, rock-salmon | catfish or dogfish (renamed to increase salability) |
| Rocket |
Arugula |
| Rolo mints |
Similar to Lifesavers candy |
| Roly-poly, jam roly-poly, roly-poly pudding |
Suet pastry pudding, often served with jam, made
into a roll (never saw it, the only time I've seen suet is made into bird-feeders) |
| Rosy Cockney Rhyming Slang (Rosy Lee) |
Tea |
| Sandwich made with corned
beef, Swiss cheese, and sauerkraut, on pumpernickel or rye bread. |
Reuben |
| Rum and black | Rum and black currant juice |
| Runner Bean | Green bean, scarlet runner, pole bean, String
Bean? |
| Salad onion |
Green onion, spring onion(less common) |
| Salt beef |
Corned beef (corn referred to spices which were
in large grains) |
| Sarnie (slang) |
Sandwich |
| Spicy condiment made from
chopped tomatillo, jalapeño, and perhaps onion, garlic, cilantro,
tomato, and oil. |
Salsa |
| Salted cracker | Saltine |
| Sandwich |
Sandwich has the bread buttered, in addition
to the contents, if any. (US may use mayonnaise instead of butter, or
no spread at all- generally packaged sandwiches where they don't want
the sogginess to tell you how old they are.) |
| Sausages, pork |
Sausage links, links (pork sausage also used
in US) |
| Savouries |
Savory appetizers or dessert. |
| Savoury filling- fruit filling | Used on pancakes (see pancakes), possibly other
uses? Savory is not sweet, usually involving meat |
| Scallion |
US has them (no need to approximate them) |
| Scoff | Gobble down, scarf (scarf is used in US) |
| Scone |
Closest equivalent is what's known as an English
Muffin. |
| Scotch woodcock |
Anchovies on toast |
| Scotch |
Whiskey (or you could say Scotch) |
| Scrump |
Steal fruit from orchards (no US equivalent word) |
| Scrumpy |
Strong home-brewed cider - more recently
associated with a high-alcohol brand named Scrumpy Jack (not a sophisticated
drink, one presumes) |
| Seed-cake seeds. |
Caraway seed-cake, a bit like a bundt cake or
pound cake, but with whole caraway seeds. |
| Shandy | Beer and lemon-lime soda, possibly lemonade.
|
| Flavoured ice, sorbet. |
Sherbet |
| Sherbet |
Flavored fizzy candy powder |
| Sherbet Fountain |
Sweet-sour fizzy powder inside licorice 'straw'
in waxed paper tube. Bite the ends off the licorice & then either
attempt to suck the powder through it, or wet it & dip it in the powder.
Closest is Pixie Stix (but that's just the powder in the paper tube).
|
| Frying pan |
Skillet (Frying pan is also
used in US) |
| Drink made of soda or fruit
punch blended with crushed ice (I used to like the blue one- although
I never knew what flavor it was) |
Slushy |
| Smarties |
Chocolate candy similar to M&M's |
| Snags (Australian) |
Sausages |
| Soldiers |
Toast cut into convenient strips, especially
for children, for instance for dunking into soft boiled eggs. |
| Sultanas |
Golden raisins |
| Smarties |
Chocolate candy similar to M&M's |
| Green bean grown for its
pods (as opposed to shell bean) |
Snap bean |
| Sprouts |
Brussels sprouts |
| Spud |
Potato (Spud is not unknown in the US, &
may be used colloquially without causing confusion.) |
| Squash (Becoming old-fashioned, probably only said by older person) | Soda pop |
| Starters |
Appetizers |
| Stewed apple | Applesauce. |
| Stone (in fruit such as olives & peaches) |
Pit |
| Stout |
Dark, sweet beer. |
| Sultana |
Golden raisin. |
| Eggs lightly fried without
turning them over. |
Sunnyside up |
| Supermarket trolley |
Shopping cart |
| Swede |
Rutabaga, turnip (but there is another veg. called
turnip in US) |
| Sweet biscuit | Cookie |
| Sweet, sweetie, sweets |
Candy or Dessert (particularly in restaurants) |
| Various non-chocolate Sweets:Wine Gums, Cream
Toffees, Aniseed Balls, Liquorice Allsorts, Dolly mixtures, Mint Imperials,
Fruit Drops, Barley Sugar. Turkish delight, membrillo (quince paste),
Indian milk sweets, dates stuffedwith marzipan, sesame halvah, burnt
almonds, divinity fudge, fruit jellies, etc. |
Don't know any direct substitutes for these-
although I think there is a Divinity candy recipe. |
| Sweetshop |
Candy store |
| Candy that’s pulled and
worked until it’s chewy like toffee- cut into pieces & wrapped in
waxed paper (comes in many flavors) |
Taffy/ Salt-water taffy |
| Takeaway |
Takeout food or the restaurant |
| Tatties (Northern) |
Potatoes |
| Tea |
In working class, or North, last meal of the
day (6pm) in the South tea & cake at 4 or 5pm followed by supper at
7 or 8pm, dinner being a more formal meal |
| Tea break |
Mid-morning or mid-aft 10 min break. |
| Tea time |
Tradionally specific aft. time for tea,
the last meal of the day, also used to mean end of the work day, or any
break, whether or not tea is drunk |
| Teacake |
Originally, similar to an English muffin, and
eaten at tea, often refers to any small sweet cake had with tea, such
as a cupcake. |
| Tea towel |
Dish towel (tea towel would also be understood) |
| Tiffin | Light lunch. |
| Tipple |
A demure, civillised drink, usually of sherry,
Martini or some other light spirit measure. Just the one. |
| Titbit | Tidbit |
| Toad in the hole |
Sausage cooked in batter (bit like a corn dog) |
| Toffee apple |
Caramel apple (I call them 'filling pullers') |
| Take away, 'for here, or
to go?'. |
To go (food) |
| Flat round corn or wheat
flour bread similar to chapati. |
Tortilla |
| Transport café |
Roadside café mostly for commercial drivers
like a truck stop diner |
| Treacle |
Molasses |
| Treacle tart | Shallow molasses flavored pie. No direct substitute,
but if you want a sweet, sticky pie, then Pecan Pie would work. |
| Trifle |
Dessert made from sponge cake with custard, jelly,
fruit, whipped cream, and rum, brandy, or sherry. |
| Tripe | Stomach, esp. of ox, prepared as food, chitlins
(regional, otherwise considered low-class food) |
| Tuck |
Food (US does have the phrase 'tuck into that'
referring to eating) and regionally, tucker means food |
| Tuck shop |
Candy store, usu for kids. |
| Virgin polo (colloquial) |
Trebor mint, Polo mint’s main competition,
since it has no hole in the middle. |
| Wash up |
Do the dishes |
| Web’s lettuce | Iceberg lettuce. |
| Shorter frankfurter |
Weiner |
| Wellied |
Drunk (fried, blitzed, etc) |
| Welsh rabbit (rarebit) |
Cheese on toast with Worcester sauce. |
| Whole wheat grain, as opposed
to split or ground, “wheat berry bread” = bread containing whole wheat
grains. |
Wheat berry |
| Whisky, pl whiskies |
Scottish types |
| Whiskey, pl whiskeys |
Irish & US types |
| Wimpey |
Hamburger place, greasy spoon |
| Winkles |
Very small edible mollusk available as a snack,
especially in seaside areas. |
| Worcester sauce |
That's in the US, too. |
| Whole meal loaf |
Similar but not identical to, whole wheat bread |
| Sweet Potato |
Yam |
| Yard of ale |
Bulbous glass with long thin neck that holds
a yard (about 21⁄2 pints) of beer. Usually a challenge to drink in one
go, or in competition with another. |
| Yorkshire pudding |
Baked batter, usu. accompanying roast beef. |