chook

[Roxanne 21]

Vannin---please tell us about chook. I'm assuming that it something along the lines of a poultry reared in NZ?

[cjs]

This is probably more than you ever wanted to know about Chook, but found it amusing...vannin will be along shortly to fill in any blanks -

"From Mark Hansen: “I have found a term that appears to be completely Australian in usage, if not origin. The word is chook which is slang for a chicken. Is this native to Australia or did it originate elsewhere and then take root here better than anywhere else? Any ideas on the origin of the word would be helpful.”

[A] Not solely Australian, since New Zealanders make a claim to it as well. And I’m not sure that it’s actually slang: I’d prefer to describe it as colloquial regional English.

In one sense it’s natively Antipodean, since that form of the word certainly grew up there—it’s recorded in various pronunciations and spellings in Australia from the 1850s on (in New Zealand somewhat later), at first as chookie or chucky. The chook form emerged about 1900 and has outlasted the others.

In another sense, it’s actually an English word, one that was taken to Australia and New Zealand by emigrants. Back in the sixteenth century chuck was a familiar endearment. Shakespeare is first recorded as using it, appropriately enough in Love’s Labour’s Lost. It survives as an endearment in some parts of Britain today, such as Yorkshire and Liverpool, the latter having the vowel pronounced to my ear part-way towards chook (and I’m told that chook is known from various dialects). There’s the American nickname (even sometimes the given name) of Chuck, often used as a pet form of Charles, which comes from the same term of affection (the sense “to give a gentle blow under the chin” is probably from a different source, as is chuck in the sense of food that turns up in the cowboy’s chuck wagon).

All these except the given name could, and indeed still can, refer to literal chickens. The name seems to have been an attempt at imitating the clucking of farmyard fowls, so it’s a close relative of cluck, which was similarly invented.

There are other forms, too, principally the chucky one that seems to have been the first Australian version. Those of us who were young in the 1980s, or who like me had a misspent middle age, will remember the arcade game Chuckie Egg; in Britain there’s a supplier of table birds whose name is Chuckie Chicken. I’m told that in Liverpool a chucky egg can be a soft-boiled egg mashed up with butter, and chook can be a general word for food and also a mildly insulting term for an old woman."

So, what the heck! Long live all the 'chooks' of the world

[bjcotton]

For heaven sake Jean...why didn't you just tell Roxanne it was a flippin' chicken? You'll find, Roxanne, that those New Zealanders have a language all their own and half the time you haven't the foggiest what they're talking about..ain't that right Vannin?

I am very fortunate in that I get to go spend a whole month with Vannin and her family in NZ later this year. I pick up accents very easily too.

[farnfam]

Just a tiny addendum: Let us not forget the verb
'to chuck', which means to throw off, to dispose of, or to disregard.
And then there is the venerable Chuckie Cheese who is a large rat who sells fast food and has rides for kiddies. And last but by no means least let us pose the question How much wood would a woodchuck, chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood???

[Roxanne 21]

And you are a very lucky duck!!! A month in the land of FRODO!!!!! Sam is my favorite character!!! What a beautiful country NZ is. Hubby has been there on a couple occasions to "shoot" the America's Cup--yachting photograhy at its best!!!! He is always amazed at the friendliness of the people and the cultures---AND the beauty that surrounds him. I think I may visit some day before I go to the happy hunting ground---hopefully!!!

bj---it is wonderful that you can adapt so very easily----the "beauty" of being a cook--the universal language for sure. Obviously--you guys have known each other---tell us about this and some of your escapades---or at least what you dare tell!!! Interesting stories make my day--

[Roxanne 21]

CUTE!!!!! I adore anecdotes!!! Keep 'em coming

[vannin]

Thanks Jean, I didn't know all that, and I like it. Ta. We had chooks until the general work fellow complained. They were making a mess. Three of them turned out to be males, so, so well, they had to go. 4months old and 3 kgs dressed. What we so bravely did was make some salads and invited Doug and Glennys for dinner. Then told them it was walking around outside. Doug did the deed(s) I watched from an upstairs window. Shane fiddled around with salads and wine glasses, The Coward, and Glennys watched TV. Over the last 35 years she has cooked so much game it was of no interest to her. (You will meet them on Xmas day Billy). Doug is the huntin' fishin' type.

Those chooks were different, they tasted like a chicken of old. Firm flesh, tender though and easily sliced. Quite different from store bought frozen, or even organic fresh. Very very good.

[vannin]

Oh No. don't mention the Am. Cup to any NZer. what a catastrophe. 5 Down, and we laughed at the Ozzies. Heaven only knows how they will go next outing. A very different water, a very different place. And... one hopes, a very different design. I love the yachts, but it is a little discombobulating when they drown in ones own harbour. I mean, well, Really....... How crude.