CANGUINGOS AND FISH LEGS In Spain: what mothers and grandmothers tell children when they ask what to eat. CANGUINGO or candingo is a fictional dish invented by Don Miguel de Unamuno y Juno. Things that I have read, about this sentence: "On a couple of occasions Unamuno refers that when someone pointed out that some word used by him did not appear in the dictionary of the Academy his reply was: "They will put it already" . Very pertinent reaction, which implies a tacit coda ( « . . . and if they don't put it, it brings me carelessly") and demolishes the crude and widespread belief that what is not in the dictionary simply does not exist. --In Unamuno, "tragedy in twenty paintings" that hopefully one day will take the stage, its author, Pollux Hernúñez, echoes in the last scene of that desplante of Don Miguel. Sequestered in his home in Salamanca after the painful incident of the "Day of the Race" of 1936, he receives on the last afternoon of his existence (December 31 of that same year) an old acquaintance, the Salamanca cacique Diego Martín Veloz. The picture begins like this: Martín Veloz (laughing) : Conque canguingos , huh? Unamuno : Yes, sir, canguingos, can-guin-gos. Martín Veloz: Well, that one doesn't come in the dictionary. Unamuno : They will put it on. --The word canguingo (s) is a rare salmantinism that Unamuno had used in Niebla: "for four pesetas you can not ask for gollerías or canguingos in mojo de gato, and he was very demanding". Elsewhere the Songbook employs Don Miguel himself a slightly different form, candingos. In any case, the word designates an indeterminate stew, in reality non-existent and more or less fanciful and exquisite, while bizarre (note, next to it, the "cat mojo"). In Béjar and other towns in the province, if someone asks what there is to eat they can receive as an answer: "Canguingos and fish legs". Naturally, canguingo (s) is not in the common dictionary, nor does it need to be (and even if other voices from the same province appear in it, transferred from the repertoire of Lamano). Some synonyms, words or similar expressions can be canguingos gisaos a la jota , si señor con las patas verdes y el culo colorao , canguingos and archifaifas
