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[-] beefbaby182@lemmy.world 116 points 1 year ago
[-] Vengefu1Tuna@lemm.ee 17 points 1 year ago

Please, "Tuna Fish" is my father. Just call me "Tuna".

[-] Pons_Aelius@kbin.social 75 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

As far as I know Tuna-fish is only a nth American thing and sounds very weird to my ears.

So this vote will likely be Nth America vs the rest.

Honestly, why only tuna fish?

Salmon-fish?

Chicken-bird?

[-] chrizbie@lemmy.nz 25 points 1 year ago

You can tune a piano but you can't tune a fish

[-] ivanafterall@kbin.social 9 points 1 year ago

But you can tuna fish, so where does that leave us?

[-] chrizbie@lemmy.nz 5 points 1 year ago

I guess it leaves us with Sandwich fillings

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[-] spongebue@lemmy.world 20 points 1 year ago

Is it really that hard to write the word "north"? Is that even what nth is supposed to mean? I keep reading it as the mathematical "1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th..., nth" and it makes my head hurt

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[-] Nemo@midwest.social 16 points 1 year ago

"tunafish" sounds weird but "nth American" (not first or second or thirteenth but nth) sounds fine?

[-] Pons_Aelius@kbin.social 7 points 1 year ago

‘We have really everything in common with America nowadays except, of course, language’ - Oscar Wilde

[-] GrimSheeper@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

We don't talk about 1st America and 2nd America

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[-] allan@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

Swordfish? Plenty other languages keep the fish-part in the Tuna name, also

[-] Pons_Aelius@kbin.social 9 points 1 year ago

Not the same as there is no one calling a swordfish just sword.

Plenty other languages keep the fish-part in the Tuna name

Do they? Which ones?

[-] Dicska@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Hungarian here. Probably it would sound weird without the 'fish' bit, since we call it 'tonhal' ('hal' meaning fish). I just can't imagine someone offering some tuna to me, asking 'Ton?'.

EDIT: However, in English, I call it tuna, not tuna fish.

[-] v_krishna@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago

Danish/swedish/norwegian, tunfisk/tonfisk

[-] omgitsaheadcrab@sh.itjust.works 5 points 1 year ago

German for example

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[-] nix@merv.news 30 points 1 year ago

Why is this a pinned post 😅

[-] Annoyed_Crabby 14 points 1 year ago

It mean it's very important. Lemmy NEED to know.

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[-] j4k3@lemmy.world 17 points 1 year ago

All you crazy foreigners just don't realize. 'Merica has no regulations, sense, or laws. We call it "Tuna Fish" because just "Tuna" is sawdust and cat liter.

[-] zeppo@lemmy.world 13 points 1 year ago

I consider “tuna fish” to be outdated and regional to the South and maybe Midwest US. I grew up hearing it but at some point started wondering why tf we would say that rather than just tuna, so I’ve made a point to just say tuna since then.

[-] memmypemmy@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago

Huh, I grew up in the South and never realized it wasn’t normal to say tuna fish sandwich. I guess it doesn’t really make sense, but I still kinda like the ring of it

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[-] fidodo@lemm.ee 12 points 1 year ago

For some reason if I think of a tuna fish sandwich I imagine canned tuna, but if I think tuna sandwich I imagine whole seared tuna.

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[-] kemsat@lemmy.world 11 points 1 year ago

Is there a tuna that is not fish?

[-] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 8 points 1 year ago

Tuna piano?

[-] Badass_panda@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

There is, yes ... that's the main Spanish name for prickly pear.

Up until around 1907, your odds of encountering the fruit by the name "tuna" were about the same as the fish, when the first commercial canneries started to pop up in California... hence, a habit of clarifying between the two that stuck, even though most folks outside of the southwest had never heard of a tuna cactus.

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[-] Arin@kbin.social 10 points 1 year ago

Are there Tunas that aren't fish? We just say Tuna here in California unless we ask for yellow fin tuna or blue fin tuna

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[-] Greenknight777@lemmy.ca 10 points 1 year ago

You can't tuna fish otherwise you risk it becoming a bass.

[-] elephantium@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago

Neither. I never order a tuna sandwich. I sometimes make myself a tuna sandwich. 😂

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[-] Badass_panda@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

I order a tuna salad sandwich or a tuna sandwich, but I grew up hearing tuna fish... specifically in reference to the stuff that came in a can.

Both were equally common years ago but over time, "tuna" sans fish has won out... likely because fresh, non canned tuna is very common.

I read an article a while ago that theorized the reason for Americans calling it "tuna fish" was that it rose to prominence as a canned staple good in the 1940s, and many Americans who didn't live on the coasts had never heard of tuna before. Its light meat, when canned and cooked, was very mild and chicken-y compared with the heavily salted, oily canned fish folks were familiar with, hence both "chicken of the sea" and the precaution of labeling the can with not only tuna, but "fish".

I think an alternate explanation is probably more likely... the 1919 Oxford English Dictionary describes "Tuna" as an alternative spelling of "tunny", the old name for the fish (still used in a culinary sense in Britain) ... not coincidentally:

  • Californians would also have been familiar with the other tuna... tuna fruit, the prickly pear.

  • Possessed of both a fruit and a fish of the same name, distinguishing one from the other when canning fish seems reasonable

  • The largest canneries of tuna (e.g., the one that ultimately became Chicken of the Sea) were all based in California.

[-] EmoDuck@sh.itjust.works 7 points 1 year ago

Tuna fish = The animal

Tuna = The meat

It's like with cows and beef

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[-] 6368_39162@lemm.ee 6 points 1 year ago
[-] Redditgee@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago

Tuna. I'm in the midwest. I've lived on the west coast. I just assumed "tuna fish" was an east coast thing.

[-] Coricus@lemmy.world 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I'm in camp "Midwestern American who says tuna fish". . .but I'm also right there with the person that said they don't order them and tuna fish sandwiches are something made at home.

For the record, I don't know why the fish part is specified. It just always was. It's not like my family called it a "can of tuna fish" growing up or anything. It's just the sandwiches. Put that tuna between two slices of bread and suddenly the word "fish" gets thrown in there. Maybe it just sounds more fun if you add more syllables? Either that or somebody in the region had to explain that tuna was a kind of fish years and years ago and it just stuck.

[-] Nemo@midwest.social 6 points 1 year ago

No, I say "tuna salad" and then get disappointed when it's just chunked tuna with no vegetables or dressing.

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[-] Pratai@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 year ago

I call it whenever they call it on the menu. This is generally how everyone should order food. It’s what the servers have memorized and it’s how they understand the requests better.

[-] OldFartPhil@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago
[-] rynzcycle@kbin.social 5 points 1 year ago
[-] Black_Gulaman@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 1 year ago

We call it "fish chunk" sandwich, coz we literally can't tell if it's tina or not, we just eat it. That way we aren't disappointed.

[-] Stinkywinks@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

Id never order a tuna fish sandwich but I'd make them. I'm from pnw USA. When I say tuna sandwich I feel like it would be different than something out of a can. Tuna salad probably makes more sense but ive never had any confusion when saying tuna fish. Doing some googling, "tuna" is also Spanish for "prickly pear". So tuna could be used to describe a cactus fruit. In Cali there is a restaurant called "La tuna canyon". Not cause of the fish.

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[-] okrubbish@kbin.social 5 points 1 year ago

It's redundant. Tuna fish, wrist watch, eye glasses...

[-] CuddlyCassowary@lemmy.world 16 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Pocket watch, sun glasses, drinking glasses

[-] MajorMajormajormajor@lemmy.ca 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

drinking glasses

For one glorious moment there I thought you were some sort of sophisticated individual who has special eye glasses only for drinking.

[-] CuddlyCassowary@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago

Well, now I am!

I suppose there are always beer goggles, but not quite the same.

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[-] room_raccoon@kbin.social 5 points 1 year ago

Also piss kidneys

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[-] panja@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

Tooter fish popkin

[-] terevos@artemis.camp 4 points 1 year ago

Tuna sammich.

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this post was submitted on 28 Aug 2023
81 points (89.3% liked)

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