On the surface, you might be lead to believe that us and the Americans are pretty similar, but you’d be very, very wrong. Sure, we both watch Netflix and wear jeans or whatever, but there is an untraversable cultural gulf between us that manifests mostly in a bunch of tiny insidious things.

Take, for instance, the abhorrent dearth of kettles that leads them to boil water in the microwave: 

In another attempt to confuse and infuriate us, these weirdos decided that, unlike every other English-speaking nation that stole the word from the French, they were going to use the word ‘entrée’ to describe the meal that comes after the entrée – the ‘starter’ or ‘appetiser’, as they would have you call it. Unbelievable.

The completely justified outrage expressed by Aussies on Twitter was fuelled by cartoonist and mysterious nautical object Pixelated Boat:

Needless to say, people were perturbed:

Somehow, this is absolutely real. From the wholly reliable and trustworthy Wikipedia:

“Entrée (or entree) is often used in the United States and certain parts of Canada (except Quebec) as the name of the main course.”

Why, I hear you ask? According to ol’ mate Wikipedia again, there’s a theory that they are more correct:

“In North American English, it has been suggested that the term retains an older meaning from medieval times to the early renaissance describing a heavy, meat course.”

But that theory is also believed to be bullshit:

“It seems unlikely that 15th century French would make a renaissance centuries later in the United States especially as most other English speakers follow post-medieval French usage, generally considering the word “entrée” to mean a first course, or the dishes between the first course and the main course at a formal dinner.”

I guess they bloody just love stirring us up. 

Photo: Currys PC World.

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