1559 Nom de Food

I was in the Seattle area recently and went to this restaurant that specialized in Caribbean and Bahamaniac food. You know, stuff that's been jerked. There was nearly an incident when this rude waiter guy asked if I wanted jerk seasoning on my chicken.
So much can be conveyed with a negative attitude. Was he calling me a jerk? Nope, although apparently he was, the jerk seasoning in question came from the culinary artwork of the chef.
And he definitely wasn't a jerk. He was good. As was the food.
They also served something that was a little odd in the starch department. They called it “yuca fries.” Having been raised in the desert, I'm familiar with that iconic yucca, the Joshua Tree. But this yuca was spelled with only one C and is apparently another name for the cassava or manioc plant, which produces starchy tubers.
Gotta love any food that's named tuber.
Better perhaps than something named yuca. So much is in a name. "Mom, don't make me eat the yuca food." A whole generation raised on the Mr. Yuck poison stickers will be hard to culinarily convince. Interestingly, improperly prepared cassava can cause cyanide poisoning.
Yuca indeed.
Food names can be so confusing. Like I'm convinced I must be a really fine Asian chef. Because everything I cook turns out to be a potsticker.
Or when I heard the economy was so bad in Greece it had turned to a mostly barter economy. Everyone is still paying each other with euros. Except they're the other kind. The actual sandwich Gyro.
“Yo, I'll give you two gyros for a pack of pitas. Or even a couple cassavas...”
“Yuca! How about a potsticker instead?”
“Sorry, the only other thing I got is a jerked tuber.”
America, ya gotta love it.