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When I first saw Pommes Frites I assumed the es would be pronounced, but it mostly seems like speakers say:

pohm freet

Rather than my initial assumption of something like:

pohm-ez freet-z

Why are the es on both words almost not pronounced?

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1 Answer

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Pommes Frites is of French/Belgian origin and therefore pronounced (almost) as in French, with the typical German errors in speaking French. Germans pronounce either /pɔm fʀɪts/ (this is more common) or /pɔm fʀɪt/ (which is the correct French pronounciation).

Regional short forms are Pommes (pronounced /pɔməs/) and Fritten (/fʀɪtn/). In the short form

Eine Portion Pommes¹.

the ~es is often emphasized. For entertainment purposes, you might google 'Imbißdeutsch at youtube', where you find a funny video about nothern german slang.

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~es is also not spoken by Germans who simply try to speak German without trying to speak French or even guessing, this were French. – Toscho Mar 8 at 6:33
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@userunkown I added some pronounciation examples. Hope you don't mind. – user1914 Mar 8 at 8:50
mind googling youtube will not help – Vogel612 Mar 8 at 12:52
you still cannot google @ youtube ;) – Vogel612 Mar 11 at 14:26
ich bezog mich auf das benutzen des wortes "google". es geht darum dass nur bei google gegooglet(?) werden kann, bei youtube wird nur gesucht (obwohl es ja zu google gehört ;)) – Vogel612 Mar 12 at 12:03
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