Many of us claim to be foodies but in reality struggle with pronunciation of exotic dishes and delicacies, it has been revealed. Researchers found common food faux pas include the mispronunciation of the Greek dip Tzatziki and the Italian ham prosciutto.

Other embarrassing clangers include pronouncing the silent G in the dish Gnocchi and struggling to say nicoise correctly.  The common mistake is to order a "nick-oi-see" rather than a "nee-swaz".

Other regular stumbling blocks also include an inability to get the tongue around words such as quesadillas, ciabatta, dauphinois and the cheese haloumi, the poll by GLORIOUS! Foods in the UK found.

The study also revealed one in five people order food in a restaurant they don’t particularly want purely because they know how to say it.

And more than a quarter said they refer to the number of a dish on a menu to avoid looking stupid and pronouncing it incorrectly.

"Over the last few decades we have become a lot more experimental with food as a nation and Brits have really embraced dishes from different countries," Afruj Miah, a spokesman for GLORIOUS! Foods.

"But by doing so it would appear we struggle with the pronunciation of some well-known dishes.

"It's a shame if people are avoiding ordering their favourite dishes purely because they are not sure of how to say it.

"Shop assistants and waiters will be used to customers ordering or buying food and not getting the pronunciation exactly correct."

Nearly two thirds of those studied said that they found many foods hard to pronounce and 14 percent said they have been intimidated by a waiter in a posh restaurant because they were nervous about ordering.

The cuisine we struggle most with is Japanese, followed by French and Chinese.

One in twenty even struggle to say blancmange correctly, not grasping the phonetic sound which is "bler-monj".

More than half said they prefer it if a waiter corrects their pronunciation but 20 percent said they would be mortified if this happened. 27 percent went as far to say they would find it extremely condescending.

Of those polled, 54 percent said they would welcome a phonetic pronunciation guide on food packaging and menus.

The study also found that more than a quarter of the 2000 adults who completed the poll rated their food knowledge as very good, although one in 20 said it was exceptional.

A third of people felt that those with a good understanding of exotic foods must be well-educated whereas half said they would be a "foody".

Click to page two for the top 25 food names we can't pronounce.