The above title is a well-known german expression referring to translation, and meaning 'translated and improved', that is, the translated version is better than the original one.
This expression could be applied to any form of 'conversion' , not only from language to language. Food , for example. Sometimes, a version of a certain dish is better than the original one.
The vegetarian pizza, a popular dish, has its modern roots in Naples, south Italy. I happened to eat pizza in Naples and in other parts of Italy, and didn't like it. I constantly compared it to my local pizza in Israel, and concluded that the local one was much improved, it tasted better.
There's another kind of pizza 'on the market', a non-vegetarian pizza with a minced meat topping (lamb or beef) mixed with minced veggies and herbs. This pizza is of turkish-armenian origin, and is named 'lahmajoun' (or lahmacun). They introduce it in a taboon oven, which is hot enough to cook the raw meat and dough simultaneously and the result is "to die for".
the taboon
There was an eatery near my place of work based on this turkish delicacy. So, I had quite a few lahmajouns at that time. Once, I told someone (a tourist guide) that the first thing I 'll do if, and when I visit Turkey is to have an authentic lahmajoun. Ha,ha, ha, was his reaction, authentic or not, this, here, is the best lahmajoun you'll ever get.
Remembering my experience with pizza in Italy, I said to myself, that maybe he was right. Perhaps, the Israelis found a way to ..."verbesser' (improve) the original.
Nowadays, I seldom eat pizza or lahmajoun. I do however, eat almost daily 'tahini' (techina in hebrew), the one and only, the sauce that goes well with any pizza and with everything else. I don't care about its origins and versions. I rely only on my own version. I buy the main ingredient - sesame-seeds' paste , and make it as Sinatra would say - 'My way', adding the essential three items: lemon juice, garlic, water.
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