It might have started with the Frappuccino, the line of frozen coffee beverages sold by Starbucks. The term was coined as a combination of the words frappé (in Boston: a thick milkshake with ice cream) and cappuccino (in Italian: espresso coffee with frothed milk). While the 500+ calorie beverage was only introduced in 1995, it now represents $2B in revenue and more than 20% of Starbuck’s coffee sales.
While I wasn’t a fan of the drink, I was amused by the name – since I’m a fan of words, I liked that it was a portmanteau. Before Starbucks, the only other portmanteau food I had ever heard of was turducken; the turkey, duck, chicken hybrid.
And then two years ago, cronuts (croissants & donuts) stormed onto the scene. They were trendy and delicious. Amazingly, they are still popular. They’ve also spawned a legion of hybrid food portmanteaus:
- Birizza (biryani pizza)
- Bronut (brownie & donut)
- Brookie (brownie & cookie)
- Cragel (croissant & bagel)
- Cruffin (croissant & muffin)
- Duffin (donut & muffin)
- Flagel (flat bagel)
- Frankaroni (crispy mac and cheese with a hot dog inside)
- Moffle (mochi & waffle)
- Pizzabon (pizza on a Cinnabon)
- Pake (pie in a cake)
- Sushirrito (sushi burrito)
- Totchos (tater tot nachos)
Some of these sound like they would taste delicious and some – well – are creative names. It’s a smorgasbord of food mashups. You know, fashups.
Love the sound of Birizza and sushiritto. Now just need to try them 🙂