9 Things Rhode Islanders Say That Baffle Everyone Else

Think you could sit through a backyard cookout in Rhode Island without asking someone to repeat themselves?

You probably couldn’t if you’re from out of state.

These are the phrases Rhode Islanders say without a second thought that leave everyone else, other New Englanders included, completely lost.

1. “Cabinet”

Rhode Islanders walk up to an ice cream counter and order a “cabinet,” never a milkshake.

It’s milk, ice cream, and flavored syrup blended into one thick drink, the same basic idea other Americans know by a different name.

One state over, Massachusetts calls the identical drink a frappe.

Not in Rhode Island.

Coffee cabinets, made with coffee syrup instead of chocolate or vanilla, are the classic order at old-school stands across the state.

Ask for a “milkshake” at the counter, and expect a blank look back.

2. “Awful Awful”

Newport Creamery, founded in Rhode Island in 1928, sells its own version of that same drink and calls it an “Awful Awful.”

It sounds like a complaint, but it isn’t one.

A customer supposedly took one sip of the 24-ounce drink and called it “awful big and awful good,” and Newport Creamery licensed the name in 1948.

The chain liked it enough to buy the naming rights outright in the 1970s for $1,000.

Cheap, in hindsight.

Outside Rhode Island or nearby Massachusetts, nobody has any idea what you’re talking about.

3. “Coffee Milk”

Rhode Island has an actual, legally official state drink, and it’s coffee milk, not sweet tea or lemonade.

Lawmakers made it official in 1993.

It’s milk mixed with coffee syrup, a Rhode Island product made by companies like Autocrat in Lincoln and Eclipse in Warwick, who fought what locals still call the coffee syrup wars until Autocrat bought Eclipse outright in 1991.

Order “coffee milk” outside New England, and you’ll get a mug of coffee with a splash of milk in it.

Not the same drink.

4. “South County”

Rhode Islanders call the whole southwestern corner of the state “South County.”

No map anywhere shows a county by that name.

Ask for directions there, and a local won’t even blink.

Officially, that stretch of Rhode Island is Washington County, one of the state’s five counties.

Even locals disagree.

Some stretch South County into East Greenwich, over in neighboring Kent County; others leave out Block Island, which is technically still part of Washington County.

Tell someone from out of state to meet you in South County, and they’ll spend ten minutes hunting for a county that, under that name, doesn’t exist.

5. “Gaggers”

Rhode Island’s hot wiener carries a nickname outsiders never guess, a “gagger,” ordered “all the way” without a second thought.

The wiener comes from the New York System shops that have run in Providence since the early 1900s, despite the name having nothing to do with New York City.

At one Providence shop that stayed in the same family for nearly 80 years before selling in 2025, staff still call the wieners “gaggers,” “destroyers,” or “Greek lobsters.”

“All the way” means mustard, meat sauce, onions, and celery salt.

Never ketchup.

Ask for one anywhere outside Rhode Island, and the person behind the counter has no idea what you just said.

6. “Party Pizza”

In Rhode Island, a bakery favorite many people call “pizza strips” goes by another name at any gathering: “party pizza.”

It’s a thick, rectangular bakery pizza covered in tomato sauce with no cheese, served cold or at room temperature and cut into strips instead of slices.

Not what you’d expect.

Sicilian immigrants brought the style to Rhode Island bakeries in the early 1900s.

Bakers there started selling the extra dough with sauce on top instead of throwing it out.

Ask someone from Rhode Island to grab “party pizza” for a get-together, and they’ll come back with strips, not a single round pie.

7. “Chowder”

Rhode Islanders order “chowder” and mean something outsiders don’t expect.

It’s a clear broth, no cream like the classic New England version and no tomato like the Manhattan version.

Just clams, broth, and potatoes.

A bowl of Rhode Island chowder won’t match the thick, white New England picture in an outsider’s head.

8. “The Dunk”

Rhode Islanders still call Providence’s arena “the Dunk,” a name the building hasn’t officially carried since 2022.

It opened in 1972 as the Providence Civic Center, then picked up the “Dunk” nickname during its run as the Dunkin’ Donuts Center from 2001 to 2022.

Old habits stick.

A new naming-rights deal with Amica Mutual Insurance took over in September 2022, making it the Amica Mutual Pavilion (AMP).

Ask a Rhode Islander for directions to a show there, and they’ll still say “the Dunk” without thinking twice.

Visitors searching a map under that name come up empty.

9. “Downcity”

Rhode Islanders call the heart of Providence “Downcity,” a name that means nothing to anyone who didn’t grow up hearing it.

Residents coined the term in the early 1900s as a way to point people toward the shopping and social district downtown.

The name stuck around.

Businesses and locals still use “Downcity” today, decades after many outsiders would just say “downtown Providence” and move on.

Volunteer fire tenders light WaterFire’s bonfires along Downcity’s three rivers every evening the installation runs, spring through fall, drawing crowds back downtown.

Artist Barnaby Evans first lit the installation in 1994, and it’s since drawn more than ten million visitors back to those same Downcity streets.

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