Pronounciations

One thing has been bothering me lately: the “correct” pronunciation of food things. I say b-eg instead of b-ah-g like be-gel instead of b-ah-gel. In my defense, I’m from Minnesota. So how do you pronounce:

• herbs
• bagel
• salmon
• pecan
• orange
• alfalfa

???

There’s a huge map on the web you can find with voice samples from natives of various states. It’s nerdy awesome. The Acoustical Society of America covers this topic. See the awesome dialect map and abstract here.