Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/06/19/how-to-pronounce-worcestershir.html
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“Worcestershire” is pronounced just how it looks, but “sauce” is pronounced “Throatwarbler Mangrove”.
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It’s the only “steak sauce” in my house.
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wust-a-shear.
I’ve never considered it a steak sauce on it’s own. I use it more like I would use a vinegar as an additive to a sauce, or for marinades, etc.
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In general (and ignoring in this case the existence of Worcester, MA) it is hard to know what the right American pronunciation of words like this should be, because when British pronunciation breaks free of its orthographic moorings, there’s no clear logic for mapping it to a rhotic accent.
On Garbage Island, we pronounce the word as “woostashih”, because most people here wouldn’t pronounce any of those “r” sounds anyway. So it’s not clear whether it should map to “woostershear” or “woorstershear” in Merkan, because we don’t know if the “r” in “orcest” survived the mangling process or not.
People in the West Country do have rhotic accents, and they generally pronounce it “woostershear”, i.e. ignoring the first “r”, but not always, and it might just be because they’re aliterate cider-addled bumpkins.
I would recommend “worstershear” for Americans, because it feels like that’s justifiable while also moving back towards how the word is spelled. But Americans should probably still pronounce “Featherstoneshaugh” as “fanshaw”, because that “r” is long gone.
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‘Wust-a-shuh’ would do.
[Typed in Lank-a-shuh 
]
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all i know is, i have a new fun way to pronounce “sauce.”
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Worshersher. Fight me.
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Lea and Perrins
Easier all round and still owned by Heinz
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I was told as a child by my English grandfather it was just “worster”. I’m going to go out a limb and guess that there is no accepted pronunciation.
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When the USAF sent me to England back in the 80’s, one of the other airmen in our shop told me that he would coach an American-style football team up in Lester. We didn’t have Google back then…
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Wercherchercher sawce
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Salsa inglesa.
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That’s the American spelling, like aluminum or vitamins.
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Apropos of exactly nothing, my favorite name of all P.G. Wodehouse’s characters is “Sir Jasper ffinch-ffarrowmere”. Any other suggestions?
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Anchovy sauce
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I have this children’s book (from a series on construction, heavy machinery, demolition and so on). It’s written in rhyme and in one section it insists that the word “saw” rhymes with “roar”. My 5-year-old son has just started to notice the discrepancy – my southern Ontario/Great Lakes/Golden Horseshoe drawl just can’t pronounce “saw” that way.
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Is he the one who could tell the difference between capital and lower-case F’s in speech?
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English Soy Sauce? Around Boston Massachusetts it’s Wusstasheeah with the accent on the first syllable.
Wist-uh-shur.
No thank you.
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