"APP": a new (?) meanaing

[Laurence Horn]

I can imagine the menu come-on:  Fried calamari? We have an app for that!

LH

On Sep 3, 2013, at 12:35 PM, Ben Zimmer wrote:

> On Tue, Sep 3, 2013 at 12:15 PM, Charles C Doyle wrote:
>>
>> I noticed over the weekend that TV ads for Appleby's restaurants use "app" to
>> mean 'appetizer' (possibly intending also a play on the name of the Appleby's chain).
>>
>> Does "app" as an abbreviation for "appetizer" occur elsewhere? (It's hard to search.)
>> Will it now find its way into the general lexicon?
>
> It's already fairly common, and not just at Appleby's. Not recent
> either: a Jan. 19, 1989 Boston Globe review of Latacarta restaurant in
> Peterborough, N.H. mentions an appetizer called "Sea Cap's App," and a
> Nov. 20, 1992 article in Restaurant Business quotes Elka Gilmore,
> executive chef at Elka Restaurant in San Francisco, as saying, "If
> tempura's not our number-one app, then it's a close second."
>
> It's possible that Appleby's is capitalizing on the similarity of
> "app" to its brand name, much as the 'computer application' kind of
> "app" has been a handy term for Apple:
>
> http://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/how-we-got-an-app-for-that/
>
> (I mention the 'appetizer' meaning in that column.)
>
> --bgz
>
> --
> Ben Zimmer
> http://benzimmer.com/
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org