It can mean either, depending on context, here. If you tell someone to go wash up before dinner, you’re saying they should wash their hands, because it’s almost ready. If someone volunteers to wash up after dinner, they’re doing the dishes.
And an American vest is always sleeveless, and is worn over a shirt and (if applicable) under a suit jacket. A “three piece suit” is matching slacks, vest, and jacket. Two-piece suits (just slacks and jacket) are the more common style now, though, so you don’t see vests much any more. Somewhat more casual is a “sweatervest”, a knit wool garment like a sweater, usually with buttons up the front, and no sleeves.
An American tank top is basically a sleeveless T-shirt, often worn as an undershirt (they’re sometimes worn as the sole garment on the torso, but that’s regarded as rather low-class).
Since no one else has stepped up to defend American cheese… there is real American cheese that the Kraft slices are imitating; Kraft slices themselves are ‘cheese food,’ not actual cheese, but you can get slices of actual American cheese at any US deli. It’s a pleasantly mild yellow cheese, and good for sandwiches, and worlds better than that stuff in the individual plastic wrappers.
In the Texas A&M Corps of Cadets, they’re called “Fasteners” until the cadet’s Junior Year, because they’re not allowed to say “Butt”
Similarly, the little rows of metal teeth things on your pants and some of the jackets are called a “Corrugated Fastener”, for similar reasons (they can’t say “Zip” until their senior year)
Actually, I did this on page 2. But it was easy to miss.
Another note about American cheese: It was originally just cheddar-type cheese. American-made cheddar was cheaper than British cheddar, even after shipping back across the ocean. So the term “American cheese” is actually sort of a Brit thing, as the exporters would label their cheese as such in order to play on the brits who went to buy lower quality but cheap “American cheese”. In America, it would have been highly redundant to sell cheddar as american cheese, so they just labeled it cheddar or yellow cheese or plain old cheese. The later advent of processed cheese and the increasing quality of American cheeses in general, combined with connotations of “American cheese” being low quality, led to the (then) inexpensive processed cheeses taking over the name, whilst quality cheeses were either relabeled for Europe or given new variety names.
Modern American Cheese is highly varied. The deli blocks have a more traditional texture, while things like Velveeta are made from a much higher whey content (which is no longer synonymous with cheap). The coolest thing is how they make wrapped slices: the cheese stuff is poured into the wrapper as a thick liquid and the package is sealed, then the cheese congeals into a slice.
I’m missing the distinction between “American Cheese” and cheese that is American. We have excellent cheeses. The crap the comes in individual wrappers – regardless of brand – is just absolute crap. That’s what I call “American Cheese,” as opposed to cheese that is American.
If someone could point me in the direction of individually wrapped cheese slices that aren’t horrendous, then I’m willing to take a gamble. I absolutely love cheese.
I have a lovely DK book on sports cars. It was obviously edited for the American market because most of those terms come pretranslated. But, when talking about a Morgan Plus 4, what’s the point? Yeah, I’ve read Road & Track most of my life and was a huge Henry N. Manney III fan, so they trip easily off my tongue, but kids need to go through the same training program (programme?). Yeah, those are different words. Figure it out from context and DEAL WITH IT!
This is where I disagree with you – American cheese (as in processed cheese that sometimes comes in individually wrapped slices) gets a bad rap (wrap?). It’s a super creamy and meltable cheese that has a distinctive flavor but isn’t overpowering. There are higher and lower quality brands, but I don’t think it’s accurate to say that it’s inherently crap. Wrapped Kraft slices are pretty decent (to me), or you can go to the deli and get some sliced off of a block.
There is such a thing as “American cheese”, called by that name, that isn’t the individually-wrapped slices. It’s not the best choice of cheese for anything (except for a Philadelphia cheesesteak, though YMMV), but it’s an extremely versatile cheese, and almost anything you use almost any cheese for, you can use American cheese at least adequately.
Yeah, “bum bag” seems to be the preferred term for that item in the UK.
There’s a memorable scene in “The Office” (original, UK version) where Keith is giving travel tips to Dawn (who’s planning to a trip to the US), and he advises her that a “bum bag” is called a “fanny pack” in the States, because, as Keith helpfully explains: “Fanny means your arse over there… not your minge.”
And my wife alway’s asked the baby’s dummy to get its pacifier, but then she always liked to take the mickey out of me…but eating mice is a secret just between the two of us.
Hmm…to me an ass is a stupid / incompetent person, while an arsehole would be some body that is deliberately mean, obtuse or unhelpful, or otherwise goes out of his way to make my life difficult
And yes I would pronounce them differently (i.e ass vs arse)
There is a variety of cheese that has the name “American,” just as “(Monterey) jack,” “colby,” “cheddar,” “emmental,” “brie,” etc., are names of varieties of cheeses. In fact, “American” is a subset of “cheddar” in terms of style.
The confusion is that “American” cheese is also the variety of cheese that is most commonly copied by processed cheese and processed cheese food makers. “Cheddar” and “Swiss” are also commonly varieties that are copied by processed cheese and processed cheese food makers.
Here’s the error.
“American” is not equivalent to “individually wrapped slices.”
Yes, the vast majority of individually wrapped sliced cheese is meant to be the processed version of American cheese.
It’s the same way that tea bags are supposed to be the convenient mass market replacement for genuine loose tea. You can get “Darjeeling” black tea in tea bags, but that doesn’t mean that “Darjeeling” means the tea that comes in bags.
Ah, yes. I see your point. I cannot recall, however, ever having seen a block of “American cheese” at any of the grocery store deli counters, although to be honest it may be for not having looked for it. Similarly, I’ve never seen “American cheese” in block form in the cheese cooler, either. I’ll look for it next time.
The real irony, in my experience, is that at my local grocery store, the real American cheese (the stuff you get from the deli counter in blocks) is actually cheaper than the individually-wrapped pseudo-cheese things.
