Food for talk

New lingo

As the world is increasingly being introduced to various cuisines and food styles, new food terms are also catching on.

    So, if you hear someone inviting you over because it’s ‘wine o’ clock’ or taking a picture with a table full of food and uses the hashtag ‘foodgasm’, don’t be surprised — it’s hip now.

    A word that’s being popularly used these days is ‘foodie’, which means someone who loves food and likes to be associated with food.

Bhandavya, one such ‘foodie’, claims that she often hears new terms like these. She says, “I’m surrounded by people who love to eat. I recently heard a word called ‘gastrosexual’, which means someone who deploys their culinary aptitude to attract romantic partners, and I thought it was rather creative of someone to come up with that.”

 “There’s also a word called ‘foodspo’, which refers to someone who is addicted to food pictures on Instagram and other social media websites. I love being called a ‘foodie’ because I love to eat a lot. This word makes me feel welcomed in a part of community that’s widely accepted, and to be honest, who doesn’t love food?” she asks.

Well, Bhandavya is right by asking ‘who doesn’t love food’ as there are many who claim they live to eat.

     And what do they do when they don’t get food on time? They get ‘hangry’ — yet another word which describes a state of acute hunger and often leads to one getting extremely irritated.

Ganesh Nayak, an IT professional, is often ‘hangry’ when he doesn’t get his food. He says, “I am someone who is very thankful for the food I get, and also enjoy most of it when it arrives on the table. ”

The number of ‘foodies’ experiencing ‘aporkcalypse’ — a lack of pork supply — and ‘bratophobia’, where one does not enjoy noisy children at restaurants, are also increasing.

      However, many  opt for ‘vinotherapy’ — a treatment with wine or with its product — and ‘drinkorexic’ — skipping meals so that one can avoid calorie consumption when drinking — and hope to find comfort in it.

Murvindran Venugopal, a dentist, comments on the new trend and says, “I think it’s pretty amazing how there are so many new words that we can use to describe food. Though these are not words that are officially listed anywhere, they are just circulating among ‘foodies’. Since food is something very subjective, with words as catchy as these, it makes our subjective perspective seem universal.”