SLANG and CANNOLIS

GENTLE READERS,

Lest you imagine that Miss Dish operates in a vacuum outside the concerns of the very readers who have MADE HER WHAT SHE IS TODAY, read on to see how a crafty Miss Dish fan enacted a word ban. If there are any other word wonks out there concerned about usage, please do write in. However, Miss Dish does not care to hear again from the crusty fellow whose panties were in a bunch about her use of "willy-nilly"--he was a bore.

Tonyg@afreeemailprovider.com wrote:

From your 1/29/03 column: Please, please, please don't use the word "crunk" again. I'm embarrassed for you. That is all. I enjoy reading your writing on a regular basis. Keep it up.

Tony

Caryn Brooks <cbrooks@wweek.com> responded:

I'll consider the banning of crunk. Convince me more why that (and perhaps "percolated") should appear only in Mary J. songs and not in the musings of the clearly not-from-the-block Miss D. and I'll make it a promise.

PS: I'm embarrassed for myself more often than not.

Tonyg@afreeemailprovider.com wrote back:

Convince you? A challenge! Well...

1) Crunk is so early 2000.

2) Flava Flav doesn't even use it anymore.

3) Do you wish to sound like a hip skateboarding food columnist?

4) After you use "Crunk" one time, you are just a few words away from writing something like, "Fo shizzo, if you want to get yo eat on and yo drink on, check out this phresh stoopid Pho joint on Powell...." You get the idea.

Tony

Caryn Brooks <cbrooks@wweek.com> responded:

OK, I'm convinced. I have officially banned crunk.

*

Have you happened upon the little Italian bakery that's situated somewhat incongruously at 1936 N Killingsworth St.? This place isn't the kind of Italian that people in Portland are used to--you won't find the achingly authentic regional dishes from the boot that are so in fashion here. No, DiPrima Dolci specializes in the starchy delights Italian Americans have been fattening up their kin with on the East Coast for eons: gooey calzones; stomach-stuffing sausage bread; rich, decadent tortas and the ever-elusive cannoli. Ah, the cannoli. It's a hard one to master, and once you've had the top-tier specimens it's hard to dig into the scientifically flawed. DiPrima Dolci makes a decent cannoli--not perfect by any means, but it fills the jones. Owner Pat DiPrima-LeConche came to Portland from New York 13 years ago and "missed the food I grew up with and thought that other people might miss it, too." She left her job at TriMet and delved into Western Culinary Institute's weekend baking program. The cannoli are her pride and joy, and she makes the shells using wooden dowels given to her by a baker in New York who'd had them in his family for decades. DiPrima Dolci, 1936 N Killingsworth St., 283-5936.

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