# It doesn't sell! Let's call it something else! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** food-cooking\ **Created:** [January 22, 2023, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624 "2023-01-22T21:34:54Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/41 "2023-01-23T20:13:58Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > Top round is not flank steak - different parts of the cow. You make London broil from flank steak; the cooking method is essential to keeping it tender. “London broil” I’ve found to be a nebulous term that means different things in different places to different people. Wikipedia says this: > “London broil” originally referred to broiled [flank steak](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flank_steak), although modern butchers may label [top round](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_round), coulotte, or other cuts as “London broil”, and the term has come to refer more to a method of preparation and cookery than to a specific cut of meat.[[3]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_broil#cite_note-3) What they sell at my grocery here in Chicago as “London Broil” is definitely not flank – that they sell separately at a higher price point. Similar are terms like “pot roast” – for me, that should be “chuck,” but I have no idea what cut “pot roast” is to the people that label it as such. It doesn’t really label a cut so much as the method it is intended for, I guess. Then there’s “Delmonico” which could any of several cuts, as well. ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/42 "2023-01-23T20:14:18Z")
There’s the recent trend of “diet” soft drinks being rebranded as “zero sugar”. Apparently part of the reason for that is that some men won’t buy anything labeled “diet” because they consider them to be for women. I’m guessing this thread was mainly intended to be about foods and beverages since it was started in Cafe Society, but I can think of some examples where the same sort of thing has been done with cars: The Plymouth Volare / Dodge Aspen got a reputation for being unreliable. Let’s restyle them and call them the Plymouth Gran Fury / Dodge Diplomat / Chrysler Fifth Avenue! By that point Chrysler had solved most of the reliability problems. I’m not sure if they were particularly great cars, but they weren’t as bad as their predecessors. By the end of the Vega’s run GM fixed the oil consumption problems by adding iron sleeves to the cylinders. But the Vega had such a bad reputation by then no one was buying them anymore. So they reskinned it and called it the Monza. ---
**Author:** ![sitchensis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sitchensis/32/4892_2.png) [@sitchensis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sitchensis)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/43 "2023-01-23T20:42:55Z")
A London broil is not a cut of meat. It is a cooking method. Every butcher, grocery store, and restaurant disagrees with you. . ---
**Author:** ![carrps](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carrps/32/2957_2.png) [@carrps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carrps)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/44 "2023-01-23T20:51:20Z")
I think it’s come to be referred to as the cooking method, but when I was a kid, flank steak was always what London broil was. It’s morphed and become amorphous. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/45 "2023-01-23T20:54:44Z")
> [@sitchensis](#): > > A London broil is not a cut of meat. It is a cooking method. Every butcher, grocery store, and restaurant disagrees with you. . Funny, every time I ever ordered London broil in a restaurant, it was flank steak. I’ve never seen it with any other cut – until recently, when, for some reason, they make it with different cuts. They make an inferior London broil, but I guess if you’ve never had the real thing, you wouldn’t notice. ---
**Author:** ![sitchensis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sitchensis/32/4892_2.png) [@sitchensis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sitchensis)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/46 "2023-01-23T21:32:27Z")
Odd, I have had a coulotte and a strip steak served in the fashion of a London broil. A lot of good restaurants don’t want to serve substandard cuts even when traditional. Considering the dish was first publicized in 1931 and people have been talking about it not always being flank steak since at least the mid 1960’s I’m really not sure about “recently”. That was way before my time. ---
**Author:** ![carnut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnut/32/3531_2.png) [@carnut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnut)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/47 "2023-01-23T21:38:56Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > London broil has been around for over 70 years That does not change the fact that they came up with a way to sell flank steak by selling it under another name. And I do agree about the use of better cuts, easier to cut, but not as tasty. ---
**Author:** ![WildaBeast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wildabeast/32/6_2.png) [@WildaBeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WildaBeast)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/48 "2023-01-23T21:52:47Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Doesn’t the meat industry do this? Find some obscure muscle or bit of a beef carcass that’s not particularly valued, slap a new name on it and provide recipes for making something desirable from it. IIRC that’s how tri-tip (A cut of meat that’s still not very well known outside of California) came to be. Most butchers would just grind up that triangular shaped piece of meat from the bottom of the sirloin for hamburger. Then one butcher in the 1950s decided to try putting a spice rub on it and roasting it, and it proved popular. ---
**Author:** ![phs3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8491ac/32.png) [@phs3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phs3)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/49 "2023-01-23T21:56:40Z")
Indeed. We had a small Goldstar TV that outlasted several much more expensive name brands. YMMV. Lucky and Goldstar were really the same folks anyway: > **[LG Corporation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LG_Corporation)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > > LG Corporation (or LG Group) (Korean: 엘지), known as LG and formerly Lucky-Goldstar from 1983 to 1995 (Korean: Leokki Geumseong; Korean: 럭키금성; Hanja: 樂喜金星), is a South Korean multinational conglomerate founded by Koo In-hwoi and managed by successive generations of his family. It is the fourth-largest chaebol in South Korea. Its headquarters are in the LG Twin Towers building in Yeouido-dong, Yeongdeungpo District, Seoul. LG makes electronics, ch... ---
**Author:** ![Mops](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mops/32/16494_2.png) [@Mops](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mops)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/50 "2023-01-23T22:02:27Z")
In the 2000s public opinion and media here in Germany widely decried the use of _Analogkäse_ (the name as well as the substance - cheese analogs using fats and proteins cheaper than those from milk) in cheap pizzas etc. The term _Analogkäse_ was eventually banned as being deceptive. Nowadays the food industry sells the same thing as _veganer Käse_ (vegan cheese), at a premium. Go figure. ---
**Author:** ![teelabrown](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/teelabrown/32/8412_2.png) [@teelabrown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teelabrown)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/51 "2023-01-23T22:04:20Z")
Years ago I had an extremely tasty dish of clams in a restaurant. The menu listed them as “varnish clams”. I’ve hunted for them ever since, and have discovered that marketing people have renamed them “savoury clams”. The word “varnish” didn’t refer to their flavor, but to fact that the interiors of the shells were glossy purple, as though they had been varnished. Still not a appetite-inducing word. But I haven’t been able to find savoury clams, either. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/52 "2023-01-23T22:04:28Z")
IIRC, “Gold Star” is the Korean name of the planet Saturn. At least, that’s how it translates into Russian. Just sayin’. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/53 "2023-01-23T22:13:15Z")
“Star of Soil” is what the Korean word translates to (from what I can find). > 토성 (toseong) is the Korean word for Saturn. 토 means _earth_ (as in dirt), which gives the meaning “Star of Soil”. [Day 55: The planets in Korean, their meanings in English & Korean | A new day, a new thing](https://anewdayanewthing.wordpress.com/2015/02/24/day-55-the-planets-in-korean-their-meanings-in-english-korean/#:~:text=%ED%86%A0%EC%84%B1%20(toseong)%20is%20the%20Korean%20word%20for%20Saturn). Perhaps better cite here: > **[토성 - Wiktionary, the free dictionary](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%ED%86%A0%EC%84%B1)** ### Etymology[[edit](https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=%ED%86%A0%EC%84%B1&action=edit§ion=2)] [Sino-Korean](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Sino-Korean#English) word from _[土星](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E5%9C%9F%E6%98%9F#Korean)_, from _[土](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E5%9C%9F#Korean)_ (“earth”) + _[星](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E6%98%9F#Korean)_ (“star”) ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/54 "2023-01-23T22:23:35Z")
I stand corrected. “Gold Star” is Venus, not Saturn. Which is kind of strange, since Venus is usually brilliant white, while Saturn glows yellow. A fellow student at Middlebury (a Korean) translated all the names of the planets for me back in 1988 or '89. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/55 "2023-01-23T22:29:25Z")
> [@Chefguy](#): > > Surprised they didn’t change it earlier, as Gold Star, like a lot of early Korean imports, had a terrible reputation. > [@california\_jobcase](#): > > I have a 25 year-old GoldStar microwave, and it still works perfectly. I guess that’s only one data point, however. I had a Gold Star microwave oven. It only lasted 18 years. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Wolf333](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolf333/32/3460_2.png) [@Wolf333](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wolf333)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/56 "2023-01-23T23:14:30Z")
It’s not fake leather, it’s vegan leather. ---
**Author:** ![carnut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnut/32/3531_2.png) [@carnut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnut)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/57 "2023-01-23T23:16:04Z")
My parents had a Gold Star refrigerator. It lasted at least 25 years and was sold when the 'rents up and retired to AZ. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/58 "2023-01-23T23:18:53Z")
Comcast. Not “Xfinity”. Crummy old Comcast. There. I said it. ---
**Author:** ![carnut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnut/32/3531_2.png) [@carnut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnut)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/59 "2023-01-23T23:31:58Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > Comcast. > Not “Xfinity”. > Crummy old Comcast. With crummy old Comcast customer service. Hard as hell to get ahold of a human. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2023, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624/60 "2023-01-23T23:47:43Z")
AKA the pectoralis minor muscle of a chicken (or other fowl, if appropriate). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/it-doesnt-sell-lets-call-it-something-else/978624.md?page=4)