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Mr. Jurafsky and colleagues from Carnegie Mellon University analyzed more than 6,500 online menus containing some 650,000 dishes. While cheaper menus had more dishes and wordier descriptions, they found, more-expensive menus tended to use longer words, with each additional letter of length correlating to an 18-cent-higher price a dish. Root & Bone’s menu, Mr. Jurafsky said, contained a few more participles (grilled, loaded, stuffed, dusted, brined) than you typically see on menus where meatloaf costs $24. Not that the extra words always gave a clear idea of the creative dishes to come.