I lived in the SF Bay Area/Santa Cruz all my life until moving to the Central Valley. Ammand in the CV, almond everywhere else. I still pronounce it almond.
awe-mend
The main ammond growing areas are centered around Chico and Modesto. I’d bet that if you’re not within a half hour drive of one of those places, you don’t pronounce it that way.
ETA: And if you drive fast, I think you can make Modesto to Stockton in a half hour …
I grew up in Amond country - bumfuck northern Sacramento valley Colusa county. It’s pronounced that way because you shake the 'ell out of those nuts to get 'em off the tree. Bwahahahahahaha!!!*
40 years ago in the Sacramento area there was an irritating commercial that jingled “you say aLLLLmonds and I say AAAAAmonds.” Almond Joy was always with the “L”
But lot’s of people in the Sacramento Valley will use the L. Actually, I just looked up an almond growing area map(warning may be pdf). Looks like south of Sacramento toward Fresno has the volume - but those are also bigger counties than the north. So it’s a lot bigger area that a 50 mile line.
It’s a regionalism that I make sure I pronounce without the L just because.
*I’ve waited years for that.
Same, but I’ll raise you that I say “sal-mun”, not “sam’n”.
D: China Guy, I wanted to be the one to make that joke!
My cousins are ammond farmers up in Ceres, and they love that one.
Here’s a bunch of photo’s of almond shakers. They literally do shake the hell out of the almond trees so the nuts fall down on a tarp like thing, and there you go. Nuts
Opps. here’s the link: almond tree shaker - Bing images
I’m not one to point fingers. For me…
almost = all mund (ɑlmǝnd)
salmon = sall mun (sælmǝn)
I pronounce the l in every single one of those words.
That’s how I learned to say it when we lived in Davis when I was little. We had an “ammond” tree in our yard. Also, it’s a different vowel than the one used in “almond.” It’s a shorter, less open sound - not just “almond” without the “l.”
Whenever I’ve heard other people say it that way, they’ve always been from around that same area.
I’m native to Northern Ohio and I’ve been pronouncing it that way for about 50 years now. I was astonished, as an adult, when I began to come across the odd person who would insist that the /l/ sound is incorrect. I just can’t hear it that way! The /l/ in almond has always been sounded in my world. It is no hypercorrection. That simply is its real pronunciation for what is certainly the majority of native English speakers.
The gruff old guy who ran the corner store where all us kids in the neighborhood went to buy candy also surprised me when he said [ælmənd] with the vowel sound of Al as in “You Can Call Me Al” instead of the normal pronunciation [ɑlmənd]. That was around 1969 and really jarring to my ears. No idea where he picked up that pronunciation. But in any case the /l/ is sounded.
Yeah, the only people I know who pronounce it that way are actually Ammond farmers.
I say salmon like “jammin’” and almond like “awl-mund.” I’m positively sure I’m absolutely right. And pe-KAHNS are what you put in a pie, with a little Karo syrup. (East TN born.)
Pronounce “Al” like Peggy Bundy and rhyme “mond” with *international children’s emergency fund. *That’s how we hip people say it.
I say “ah-mund” and I’m in my mid-30s (SE England). “Al-mund” strikes me as one of those “spelling pronunciations”, like pronouncing the “t” in “often”.
Collins dictionary only gives one pronunciation, which agrees with that: /ˈɑːmənd/
Interestingly, it comes from the Old French almande, but modern French spells it amande. Was the old “l” silent too?
I think silent letters might be gradually dying out. I wonder if this phenomenon has been studied?
Another Jersey-ite, but never with ‘l’, ah-mund
‘All-mund’. SoCal native.
I was listening to NPR while driving through the Central Valley about a decade ago, and there was an interview with the head of the Almond Council (or something). It took me a while to realise that these ‘ammins’ he was talking about were almonds.
Interesting! I have the opposite impression, that people are ceasing to pronounce letter that folks used to pronounce. The first example that comes to mind is the “wh” sound, whereby I’ve run into many people (especially younger than me) who pronounce witch and which exactly the same, or wine and whine. Although I suppose now that I think about it, that’s less a “silent letter” issue than a “disappeared sound” issue.
Hmm… seems like I had other examples on the tip of my brain but now I can’t think of them.
Yep - that’s how it’s pronounced down in ‘Mo-dusty’…and Ceres, too.