ワンタン

1906 is an early Japanese point for ワンタン: Seisenban Nihon Kokugo Daijiten cites Nihon Katei Hyakka Jii and writes the food as 雲呑 or 饂飩. The Chinese family of forms includes 餛飩/馄饨 and Cantonese 雲吞, pronounced wan4 tan1 in many descriptions. English "wonton" also comes from Cantonese, so the English and Japanese words meet the same southern Chinese food term. The Japanese sound ワンタン is much closer to Cantonese than to Mandarin húntun. The Japanese borrowing grew inside Taisho and early Showa Chinese-noodle culture. Takamura Kotaro's Dotei has a 1914 example with 支那蕎麦 and わんたん, and Furukawa Roppa's diary has ワンタンめん in 1934. That placed ワンタン beside ラーメン, シューマイ, and 餃子 on Japanese menus. The compound ワンタン麺 then tied the dumpling to noodle-shop food. Modern Japanese ワンタン often means a thin wrapper with a small meat filling served in soup, or a topping in ワンタン麺. English "wonton" covers boiled, soup, and fried versions in Chinese restaurants. Mandarin often uses húntun for 餛飩, while Cantonese-style menus use wonton or 雲吞. Japanese also has packaged ワンタンスープ, a supermarket form that is less central in English. Example: ワンタン麺を注文した.