The message
from "Mike Lyle" contains these words:

I can believe the latter, but exactly why do you feel that there
is a correct spelling of chatni in Roman letters? Transliterating
Hindi (I think) to English is harder than transliterating Russian
(as in Tsebysef and over 200 variants) :-)

Not even the most alcohol-adultery-and-altitude-sodden Victorian
sahib would have qualified for the epithet "pukka" had he publicly
used the spelling "chetney". The lofty OED doesn't dignify it with a
mention, even to condemn it as a solecism.

A Hindi-speaking friend states it is pronounced (more-or-less) 'catney'.
But the Indian sub-continent is rather large, and if words can change
their sounds from region to region in this country, how much more so
might they do so there.

The offending recipe -- which I have made, in modestly scaled-down
quantity, and found very good -- calls for 30 large unripe sour
apples with, among other things (but no mangoes), 3/4 lb powdered
ginger and 1/4 lb dried chillies. I don't generally approve of apple
chutney, but after that, I found it no surprise that the Victorians
conquered the entire bloody planet.

I have visions of artillery firing salvos of Lady Cardigan's Green
Tomato Surprise...

--
Rusty
Emus to: horrid dot squeak snailything zetnet point co full-stop uk
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/hi-fi/