Re: ice cream cups

Mark wrote:

> Well, a cupcake *is* cake in a cup - cake baked in a cup,
> in fact. Taking any old cake and serving it in a cup doesn't
> make it a cupcake, but the compound is still pretty
> transparent.
>
I disagree; all the cupcakes I've ever eaten have been in muffin "cups" - paper
containers surrounding the bottom and sides but not the top of the muffin,
where you peel off the paper and start eating. I consider that expression
idiomatic - not a "drinking cup" but a "cup-like holder (for muffins etc.)".
This is why I dislike English compounds so much; they're _so_ confusing, for me
(as an amateur linguist analyzing this headache-giving stuff) and
English-learners alike!

To me it's just a lot of confusion; why not "small cake" for "cupcake" and "ice
cream in a cup-like structure" for "ice cream cup"? (No, that's too long. :))

> Around here,
>
Around where? Conlang-L or your place of inhabitance?

> "ice cream cup" refers to a cup used for
> serving ice cream. At an ice cream shop, it also refers to
> the menu item consisting of such a cup (usually paper)
> with ice cream in it, to be distinguished from an ice cream
> cone.
>
Yes, that's what I originally thought; but then I thought maybe it was something to
do with the dessert itself, and not its container.

"ice cream cone" refers to the dessert itself (usually) or the dessert's container (less often)...

But why would you put ice cream in paper? Why not something like plastic? (Unless
the dessert was ice cream and, say, cake - a cupcake with ice cream instead of
icing.)

This is getting so confusing!
            
--Robert http://www.rbtjng.friendpages.com

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