38 Comments
That is the current hot topic. :) The Europeans think it must be Mexican, those that know about Mexico say no, and it is not listed under "sandwich" in any of my dictionaries. I took a year of European Spanish, spent a month in Argentina, have been to Mexico and have Mexican friends, and I've never seen the word until Duo. brought it up.
myprofesor en Spanish explained to me the same as ramosraul. And my diccionary is in Spanish from Spain and emparedado is there.
1939
I have heard the word in Spain but I never really associated it to Sandwich (pronounced sángüich ;-) ). I guess it's only used by Duo and by rabid protectors of the True Spanish Spanish, opposed to any anglicism as a matter of principle, no matter how widespread... todos los días se aprende algo nuevo ! :-)
I will go with some cultural insight first. No worries, it's for free
So, once upon a time, English was not the language for choice back in Spain and most of Latin America (Although I have less knowledge on Latin America culture) but French. In Spanish it was accepted to bring words from French, but not that well regarded from English.
The cultural facts between the old countries might also have some part, but I do not want to talk politics... the consequence (or at least one) is that many English words were translated or a new word was "invented" ad hoc for it.
More over, in Latin America, they used different "new" words for the translation or even chose to translate different words (this leads to puzzle faces on both sides of the Atlantic when discussing certain topics)
Now, another cultural insight is that, in Spain, the English loaf (besides being clearly heretic) was not commonly used. The Spanish loafs are similar to French (although there are many tasty varieties and some commercial crap you can't even smell, in the recent days). Actually, at least in Spanish, it's common to name the English loaf as "casted bread " (Pan de molde).
Therefore, there was nothing like the "Sandwich" in Spain. You have "breads" as they come from the different types of loafs and are generally called "bocadillo(s)" and might be filled with some tasty ham, tortilla (the Spanish one) or other stuff.
As you might see, the "Sandwich" was a totally different thing, that needed a new word.
In English you can use it as a verb, as in " I was sandwiched between two lorries and now I no longer have wing mirrors", meaning "to wall". To wall also refer to that practice of sealing somebody off between to walls.
And there we are. Emparedar is the literal translation of "to wall" and therefore Emparedado, "walled", the perfect word to describe some stuff between two slices of bread.
It is not used very often any more, at least in Spain, but... there you go.
lol - the end of your explanation reminded me of the movie 'My Big Fat Greek Wedding'. There you go, the root of the word is Greek. :-P
Anyways, thank you for sharing that insight RAMOSRAUL.
hehe, I believe that might happen with a lot of words though!
I will, however, claim that the best sandwiches (proper, packed white bread, no borders, thin filling) I have ever eten were in Madrid (http://www.ferpalmadrid.com/). very close to Puerta del Sol. As you may see they advertise them as "sandwiches" :)
I think you can also buy the filling there, by the bucket.
my spanish teacher had never heard the word before and I didn't know how to explain to her why I used emparedado instead of sándwich. Now I can show her, thanks man. (:
Thank you for this. Not only is it interesting, but it helps me remember the word. Much appreciated!
Thanks for the great explanation! I just want to ask. In spain i saw a quite popular food chain, called "100 montaditos". Is it a common word or not?
At the beginning I did not think much about the meaning of the name, but the first time I went there, I discovered they called their dishes "montaditos". I asked my friends (who took me there, there were none in the region I was living at the time) what was all that about and we played a bit... So this explanation might not be that good, but it was enough for me back then.
The basis of it is that somewhere in the south of Spain they call montadito to a toast with something, say a subtype of tapas if you wish. Montar is a wide range verb that may mean from to mate, assemble up to ride. -ito is of course the diminutive.
The game is with the idea of the chain, you get the toast with something "riding" on top of it. 100 comes from the variety... might not be 100 but sounds high enough ;).
What do you think?
I did some research too) Basically, it's a small open-face sandwich, but 2 slice of bread is asseptable too. Name arises from verb "montar". Also i've found that: "El montadito está presente en la cultura popular española desde el siglo XV, con una tradición mucho más antigua que el sandwich o el bocadillo". Maybe it's a catalan or valencian word also.
Talking about foodchains... here you can have a look to the use of emparedado in common everyday Spain
http://economia.elpais.com/economia/2014/09/12/actualidad/1410517455_159738.html
Interesting the use of montadito though!
I have seen it on menus in Tenerife, in the Canary Islands. It offers a distinct choice between those and bocadillos. If I just ask for a sandwich in english, I tend to get given a bocadillo. If I ask for an emparedado, I get something more like what I think of as a sandwich, made from two flat pieces of bread.
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Emparedado? Are you kidding me? Could DL find a more obscure word? I've never heard it until now. Keep in mind the following. I am only doing this Spanish course on DL mostly out of curiosity, because heaven knows I don't need practice. For over 30 years I have spoken more Spanish than anything. I learned it in Spain, living there for two years and have been speaking it daily with my Mexican wife for over 28 years. Most of my business clients are Spanish speaking and I have clients from every Latin-american country. Emparedado is not used, at least not regularly, in the current Spanish lexicon in anywhere I know of.
Please just let us use "sandwich" (i cant make the accent on my cpu, sorry). Emparedado seems to be a word no one uses, ever.
My boyfriend is Mexican from Guadalajara and uses either "sandwich" or "torta". The latter may be a regional word. Also, when he means a long sandwich on French bread (called "baguette" in French), he says "lonche". Anyway, I believe this meal was first named by John Montagu, the 4th Earl of Sandwich, so I think it's the original word indeed and the one we should mainly use (internationally speaking, which is what is Duolingo for).
I mean this is a really stupid translation. Really no use in trying to translate a word like Sandwich into spanish, please use a different word for example. No need to lose a heart on a question like this :(
In northern Mexico we use torta, although I know that word has a different meaning elsewhere.
I keep coming back to the rules governing when to use Nosotras verses Nosotros on duo
If you're translating "we" to Spanish, either nosotros or nosotras should be accepted. If not, you should report it. If, in context, it's something like "we girls" or "us girls", than, yes, it's nosotras -- but I don't think DL gives us sentences like that.
If it's either nosotros or nosotras in Spanish, the translation is simply "we" in English. We do not distinguish between females and males in this case. (Same for "they". English only makes the distinction with he/she.)
While I've never seen anything like "we girls" or "us girls" on Duo, I have seen sentences where some other part implied that the "we" was feminine, such as the use of nuestra instead of nuestro elsewhere in the sentence. Most of the time, however, nosotros and nostotras are interchangeable for the purposes of these exercises, and it's probably a good idea to try to use both.
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JGarrick62, I agree with the second part of your comment, but a small correction on nuestro and nuestra. They are possessive adjectives that change gender based on the noun they describe and their gender does not refer to "we". Nuestro banco, nuestra casa, nuestro campo, nuestra playa. You get the idea. I just wanted to clarify that point.
What happened to "bocadillo" to translate sandwich? I am presently in Spain, and bocadillo is commonly used.
They need to slow the speech down. It sounds like Ayer comisa y un emparedado
I put yesterday at the end of the sentence and it counted it wrong!! Isn't it still right?
