Food & drink

tofu

Bean curd is Chinese 'curdled bean'. Korea, Vietnam and Japan read the characters their own way, Hokkien and Teochew migrants carried tāu-hū to Malaya, Java, Manila and Bangkok, and English took the Japanese pronunciation, which the 1970s American tofu boom spread to Europe and beyond.

Weakest linkCertain

The road to English

From Middle Chinese to Mandarin Chinese

From Middle Chinese to Korean

From Middle Chinese to Vietnamese

From Middle Chinese to Hokkien (Min Nan)

From Hokkien (Min Nan) to Malay

From Hokkien (Min Nan) to Javanese

From Hokkien (Min Nan) to Tagalog

From Hokkien (Min Nan) to Thai

From Japanese to Russian

From English to American English

From American English to German

From American English to French

From American English to Modern Hebrew

965 CEMiddle Chinese

Hops are evenly spaced; labels show the year each form is first attested.

tofu

Weakest linkCertain

The road to English

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