Here’s more French as spoken by Ricardo.
As he was preparing a dish before his televised audience, he said to go easy on the salt when adding it to his preparation. His exact words were:
Mollo sur le sel.
Easy on the salt.
Use normal French stress when pronouncing mollo (i.e., on final syllable). Mollo means gently, with moderation.
At the same time that he said mollo sur le sel, he also said:
On se garde une p’tite gêne.
We’ll hold off, we’ll hold back, let’s show some restraint, etc.
This was Ricardo’s way of insisting further on not using too much salt.
You’ve seen the expression se garder une petite gêne before when a TELUS advertising campaign linked it to pulling out one’s penis at inopportune moments.
Ricardo also uses this expression a lot:
Grosso modo.
More or less.
Use normal French stress when pronouncing grosso modo (i.e., on final syllables). Grosso modo means more or less, approximately.
Ricardo uses this expression when the amount of an ingredient to be added doesn’t need to be exact, just approximate. For example: une cuillère à soupe, grosso modo, a tablespoon, more or less.
The expression grosso modo can be used in any kind of conversation where you want to say more or less, not just when talking about cooking.
Whenever Ricardo wants to stress that preparing something in a certain way is very important, he often says:
C’est ben important.
It’s really important.
Ben is an informal, spoken contraction of bien; it sounds like the French word bain. Ben important sounds like bain n’important.
1. Mollo sur le sel.
2. On se garde une p’tite gêne.
3. Grosso modo.
4. C’est ben important.
