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帶著問題聽講解

1、“al dente”該如何理解

2、“springy”和“elastic”有何區別

3、文中有那些關於美食的英文表達

紅色表示註釋

藍色表示句子主幹

 In Italy, ‘Al Dente’（有嚼勁） Is Prized. In Taiwan, It’s All About Food That’s ‘Q.’

As dusk（黃昏） falls at Lehua Night Market, the fluorescent（熒光的） lights flicker on and the hungry customers

Neatly arranged pyramids（金字塔） of plump（圓滾滾） fish balls. Bowls brimming with tapioca（木薯澱粉） balls bathed in lightly sweetened syrup（糖漿）. 

Take a bite of any of these dishes and you’ll discover a unique texture（表示食物的口感）. But how exactly do you describe that perfectly calibrated “mouth feel” so sought after by local cooks and eaters alike?

Slippery? Chewy? Globby? （黏糊糊的）Not exactly the most flattering（adj，奉承的，討好的） adjectives in the culinary world.

Luckily, the Taiwanese have a word for this texture. Well, actually, it’s not a word, it’s a letter — one that even non-Chinese speakers can pronounce.

It’s “Q.”

“It’s difficult to explain what Q means exactly,” said Liu Yen-ling, a manager at Chun Shui Tang, a popular teahouse chain that claims to have invented tapioca milk tea in Taiwan. “Basically it means springy（adj，有彈性，誘惑力的）, soft, elastic（有彈性的）.”

Q texture is to Taiwanese what umami（n，鮮味） is to Japanese and al dente is to Italians — that is, cherished and essential. （珍視，必不可少）

The texture is found in both savory（adj，美味的，不甜的） and sweet foods, and is most often used to describe foods that contain some kind of starch（澱粉） like noodles, tapioca pearls（珍珠奶茶裡的珍珠） and fish balls. If something is really chewy or extra Q, then it could be called QQ. 

Among Taiwanese, the appreciation for Q texture starts at a young age. Asked why Q texture was so appealing to Taiwanese, Lu Wei-chen, the owner of the stand（n，攤位）, smiled and said,“It’s simple,” she said. “When you eat it, you will be in a good mood.”

flicker ：v，閃爍； flicker on光線若隱若現 

trickling in/into： 三三兩兩的進入

culinary capitals：美食聖地；culinary，adj，烹飪的，食物的

tapioca milk：珍珠奶茶

brim：n，杯子，飯碗的邊緣；v，brim with sth，杯子/碗裡裝滿了東西，快溢到邊緣了

take a bite:嘗一口咬一口

calibrated：adj，精心調配的，（工具或儀器）校準的；

springy，elastic：均指有彈性的，springy 壓縮之後能快速恢復到原來狀態的物體（如沙發），elastic 拉長/伸縮之後能快速恢復到原來狀態的材料（如皮筋）

Q texture is to Taiwanese what umami is to Japanese and al dente is to Italians 

A is to B what C is to D a之於b，相當於c之於d

starch：n澱粉，starchy：adj，含有大量澱粉的

appealing：adj，有吸引力的； appealing to某物對某人是有吸引力的