Someone was arguing that bruschetta is only the bread with the topping but obviously the topping stuff is sold without bread under the product geneeically named bruschetta
Bruschetta is the grilled bread with A topping, doesn’t have to be tomatoes, sometimes it is beans or meat. The chopped tomato and spices they sell premade at the store should probably be called Bruschetta topping.
Right but i mean isnt that an example of the copy without an original or it superseding its origin or somethinf
At some point, people started mentally conflating the bread with topping with just topping
Probably. Maybe a better term for the store prep is “Topping for Making Bruschetta”, but thats too much to say or put on a label.
I’d say it’s an example of synecdoche, referring to a part of something by the name of the whole.
Thats so interesting you brought that up, I had a vague impression of it alternatively being like that thing where its like “your ass better get here” or something where the part represents the whole. Good catch, I should have said that part, now i look like im trying to hijack your party train haha
Nnnnope
Bru(sch)…
(Etta)ll there is
Bru…
…schetta, yes, delicious
What you’re asking is one of the glories of living language.
Strictly, bruschetta is an Italian food preparation, with a specific meaning in Italy and the Italian diaspora. But, as is often the case with culture bleeding, the word got adopted and can change in meaning.
So, you run into the colloquial usage of bruschetta to mean that a topping is what turns bread into bruschetta, and thus the topping is the defining part and can be called the same without modifiers like topping being added to the word bruschetta.
With any living language, unless you have a formal version that is regulated, the usage of words are the definitions of them. The only question is degree of consensus, since if enough people agree to a set definition, any irregular usage becomes “wrong” until that changes.
That means it’s fair to say that bruschetta, in English, can mean both the dish once prepared, and the ingredient which finishes the dish.
In the United States, the word is sometimes used to refer to a prepared topping, sold in jars and usually tomato-based, instead of the bread, a sense which is unknown in Italian.
I also only know of bruschetta as an appetizer of bread+topping.
