Arugula and rocket are the same peppery, slightly bitter salad green; American English calls it arugula and British English calls it rocket. Both words trace back to the same root, so remember them as one leaf with two passports.
The core difference
Arugula and rocket name the same salad leaf; the split is dialect, American versus British.
- arugula — American English name for the peppery salad green: She tossed the arugula with olive oil, lemon, and shaved parmesan.
- rocket — British English name for the same salad leaf: She added a handful of rocket to the pasta salad.
How to tell them apart
On the plate, arugula and rocket are indistinguishable, because they are the same leaf. Arugula came into American English from a southern Italian dialect word related to standard Italian rucola, while British English kept rocket, from the same ultimate root.
Confusion is more likely with the other meaning of rocket: in British English, rocket can also mean the projectile that launches into the sky, or the verb describing something that rises or increases very quickly, as in house prices rocketed. Only the salad-leaf sense of rocket matches arugula.
