Genesis 11:7 from The Brick Testament.

Come, let us go down there and confuse their language, so that they cannot understand each other’s speech.

A couple of days ago I saw this wonderful video over at Ration Reality, showing a film that had been translated from English into French, then into German, then back into French, then back into English using a popular translation website. And I commented there that I thought a similar technique was used for translating restaurant menus in Sevilla. I thought I was joking.

Then today I was having a look at the referrers on my Sevilla Tapas blog, as I am always curious to see how people are finding the place. And I saw something odd.

Someone had used a translator on the Food Translations page (which is a list of Spanish food names translated and described in English) to translate it all into Spanish. And the curious thing was that the words that were originally in Spanish started going a bit wonky when they were ‘re-translated’.

So of course the next step had to be translating the whole thing back into English just to see if this is really how they translate menus here. And you know what? Well, just check it out and decide for yourself. Some of it is almost normal, other bits are totally bizarre.

When things stop making any sense at all just refer back to the Food Translations page. 🙂

Olives: olives

Capers: capers conserved in vinegar

Snails: small snails

Sawhorses: great snails

Croquetas: croquetas made with the white sauce and the several fillings (chicken, jamón, spinach, seafood), empanadas and fried

Vehicles

• Marrows – marrow/zucchini
• Chick-peas with of Spinach – the spinach and the chick-peas mixed with garlic and olive oil
• Habas Jamon with – ample habas green with jamón sliced of Serrano
• Rebozadas de Berenjenas – eggplant/eggplant spoiled and fried in olive oil
• Women who hides herself with mantel of Eggplants – the fried empanada eggplant ended with the white sauce
• Brave of Potatoes – the chips coins with mayonnaise and brown sauce tangy
• Alinadas of Potatoes – the potatoes boiled small marinated in the vinegar, olive oil and sliced onions of the means
• Potato garlic sauce – the chips coins in mayonnaise of garlic
• Ensaladilla – salad of the potato with the onions, the peppers, the tuna/the prawns and the mayonnaise
• Champiñones – mushrooms
• Bristles – wild mushrooms of ostra or mushrooms
• Chicken broth – ratatouille, served generally with a fried egg in cover
• Calamaries of the onions of Field – and empanadas and fried peppers

Soups

• White garlic – white soup of garlic
• Broth – chicken broth
• Gazpacho – cold soup of the tomato done with the cucumber and garlic
• Salmorejo -, gazpacho densely cremoso served with jamón sliced as Serrano and hard eggs

Emparedados

• Montatitos – small buns with the several fillings, served warm up or cold
• Serranito – toasted bun filling of jamón of Serrano, back of the pig or chicken chest and peppers roasted to parilla
• Tables – the thickness-sliced bread toasting of the country ended with jamón of salmarejo and Serrano

Eggs

• Tortilla – egg heavy tortilla of the potato
• Reveulto – the scrambled eggses were mixed with the several ingredients
• Egg quails – eggs of quails
• Egg fillings – the hard eggs filled of the tuna

Rice

• Rice – rice of the day, generally with the meat and the seafood
• Paella – rice slow-cooked with saffron, the tomatos, the meat and the seafood

Cured meats

• Iberian Jamón – sliced fine, salt cured jamón of free-range acorn-fed pigs
• Mountain Jamón – Iberian less expensive Jamon
• Cane of Back – cured back of the pig
• Morcillo – blood sausage
• Pringá – it mixes of the fat of the pig, morcillo and the pig (delicious)
• Garlic sausage – sharp sausage

Cheese

• Manchego

Pig

• Tomato with of Meat – back of pig stewed in tomato sauce
• Empanados and fried rollers of Flamequines – of the back of pig, jamón of Serrano and the cheese
• Back – pig back
• Whiskey of the a the one of Sirloin – fillet of the sauce pig of the whiskey and garlic
• Pinchitos – kebabs sharp of the pig

Poultries and game

• Rabbit – rabbit
• Cordonices – quail
• Duck – duck
• Perdices – perdiz
• Ajillo of the a the one of Chicken – the pieces of the chicken cooked in oil and olive garlic
• Plate of the the one of the a the one of Pullet – chest of chicken roasted to parilla
• Turkey – turkey
• Deer – deer meat

Meat of cow

• Meatballs – meatballs
• Tail of bull – tail of the sharp sauce bulls

Fish

• In I marinate – it binds marinated fried of Dogfish
• Codfish – codfish (generally codfish of the salt)
• Pretty – tuna
• Anchovies fried or marinated of Big holes
• Mackerels – mackerel
• Merluza – merluza
• Sword of Fish – swordfish
• Codfish spoiled and fried of Pavía – of the salt
• Squid – squid
• Salmonetes – salmonete

Seafood

• Clams – clams
• Cockle – cockles
• Stroke – lobster
• Lobsters – lobster of the rock (no claws)
• Crab – crab
• Calamaries – fried ring of the calamary
• Red of his of in of Calamaries – red calamary
• Small cuttlefishes – jibia
• Norway lobsters – great prawns
• Coquinas – clams of the rind of the wedge
• Ajillo of the a the one of the espicanardos – the bare prawns served in chisporrotear the olive oil with garlic
• Espicanardos a plate of – the prawns roasted to parilla without pelar
• Rebozadas of the espicanardos – spoiled and fried prawns
• Knives – clams of the rind of maquinilla to shave
• Mejillones – mejillones
• Ostras – ostras
• Finishing nails – fried calamary very small of the baby
• Vieira – shells of travelling