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sauce

noun · verb

Simple meaning

Flavorful relish or dressing or topping served as an accompaniment to food.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

saws
US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈsɔs

This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

noun

  1. Flavorful relish or dressing or topping served as an accompaniment to food

  2. A liquid (often thickened) condiment or accompaniment to food.

  3. slangusually "the"

    Alcohol, booze.

  4. UKAustraliaNew ZealandIndia

    Tomato sauce (similar to US tomato ketchup), as in

verb

  1. To cause to relish anything, as if with a sauce; to tickle or gratify, as the palate; to please; to stimulate.

  2. Dress (food) with a relish

  3. Add zest or flavor to, make more interesting

  4. To make poignant; to give zest, flavour or interest to; to set off; to vary and render attractive.

  5. colloquial

    To treat with bitter, pert, or tart language; to be impudent or saucy to.

  6. To add sauce to; to season.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
B1 · Intermediate
Frequency
Common
Typical Use
Everyday English

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: Flavorful relish or dressing or topping served as an accompaniment to food

Used this way, sauce is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
Matter-of-fact
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

More ways to use sauce

  • “This pasta sauce has a rich and delicious flavor.”

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

Flavorful / liquid

soy sauce

Garden

tomato sauce

Other combinations

cream saucehot saucefish saucepepper saucebarbecue saucechili sauce

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Inflected forms

Grammatical variations of the same word.

  • saucernounInflected form

    Something with a round shape resembling a flat circular plate.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • sauce espagnolenounCompound term

    Brown sauce with tomatoes and a caramelized mixture of minced carrots and onions and celery seasoned with Madeira.

  • sauce louisnounCompound term

    Mayonnaise and heavy cream combined with chopped green pepper and green onion seasoned with chili sauce and Worcestershire sauce and lemon juice.

  • sauce vertenounCompound term

    Mayonnaise with tarragon or dill and chopped watercress and spinach or cucumber.

  • sauce vinaigrettenounCompound term

    Oil and vinegar with mustard and garlic.

  • saucer magnolianounCompound term

    Large deciduous shrub or small tree having large open rosy to purplish flowers.

  • sauce albertnounCompound term

    Creamy white sauce with horseradish and mustard.

Related Words

Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.

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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.