/sɔːs/, /sɔs/, /sos/
OriginPIE word
*séh₂ls
From Middle English sauce, from Old French sause, from Vulgar Latin *salsa, noun use of the feminine of Latin salsus (“salted”), past participle of saliō (“I salt”), from sal. Doublet of salsa.
For the meaning development compare Ancient Greek ἥδυσμα (hḗdusma) ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *swéh₂dus (whence also English sweet).
- countable, uncountableA liquid (often thickened) condiment or accompaniment to food.
“apple sauce; mint sauce”
“[Prince Paul.] […] But, believe me, you are wrong to run down cookery. For myself, the only immortality I desire is to invent a new sauce. I have never had time enough to think seriously about it, but”
“You could just use ordinary shop-bought kecap manis to marinade the meat, but making your own is easy, has a far more elegant fragrance and is, above all, such a great brag! Flavouring kecap manis is ”
- Australia, India, New-Zealand, UK, countableTomato sauce (similar to US tomato ketchup), as in
“[meat] pie and [tomato] sauce”
- countable, slang, uncountableAlcohol, booze.
“Maybe you should lay off the sauce.”
“[…] she was thinking of her first husband, who was a heel to end all heels and a constant pain in the neck to her till one night he most fortunately walked into the River Thames while under the influe”
“I've been pretty much off the sauce during the last week, trying to get Pepper to like me again. (Horace won't drink with me any more.)”
- countable, slang, uncountableVitality; capability or talent.
“It's over for that guy. He lost the sauce.”
- countable, uncountableAnabolic steroids.
- countable, uncountableA soft crayon for use in stump drawing or in shading with the stump.
- countable, dated, uncountableCheek; impertinence; backtalk; sass.
“"See here, Captain!" He planted himself squarely in front of Faramir, his hands on his hips, and a look on his face as if he was addressing a young hobbit who had offered him what he called "sauce" wh”
“‘Well, you know what Matchett’s like! Just about bring herself to talk to me because I’m housemaid, but if the gardener’s boy so much as looks at ’er it’s sauce,’ said Sarah.”
- US, countable, obsolete, slang, uncountableVegetables.
“I wanted cabbage or potaters, or most any sort o' garden sarse [...]”
“[...] and all would be well only for a remark of a little boy who, when asked if he will have some more of the sauce, says he "don't want no strawberries pickled in kerosene."”
- UK, US, countable, dialectal, obsoleteAny garden vegetables eaten with meat.
“Roots, herbs, vine fruits, and salad flowers […] they dish up various ways, and find them very delicious sauce to their meats, both roasted and boiled, fresh and salt.”
“The first night of our expedition, we boiled our meat; and I asked the landlady for a little sauce, she told me to go to the garden and take as much cabbage as I pleased, and that, boiled with the mea”
- To add sauce to; to season.
- To cause to relish anything, as if with a sauce; to tickle or gratify, as the palate; to please; to stimulate.
“Earth, yield me roots; / Who seeks for better of thee, sauce his palate / With thy most operant poison!”
“Meales, uſually ſavvced vvith a healthfull hunger, vvherein no incocted Crudities oppreſſe Nature, and cheriſh diſeaſe: […]”
- To make poignant; to give zest, flavour or interest to; to set off; to vary and render attractive.
“Then fell she to sauce her desires with threatenings.” — The New Arcadia
- colloquialTo treat with bitter, pert, or tart language; to be impudent or saucy to.
“I'll sauce her with bitter words.”
“"A bit of real starvin' would do them no 'arm, and I would 'ave less sauce." "What, has Willie sauced you?" "Yes, when 'e woke up." […] "Wot did he say?" "Cursed me good and proper, 'e did."”
- slangTo send or hand over.
- abbreviation, acronym, alt-ofAcronym of Standard Architecture for Universal Comment Extensions.
Formssauces(plural) · sawce(alternative, obsolete) · sauces(present, singular, third-person) · saucing(participle, present) · sauced(participle, past) · sauced(past)