sauce
Americannoun
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sauces
plural
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any preparation, usually liquid or semiliquid, eaten as a gravy or as a relish accompanying food.
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stewed fruit, often puréed and served as an accompaniment to meat, dessert, or other food.
cranberry sauce.
-
something that adds piquance or zest.
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Informal. sauciness; impertinence; impudence.
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Slang. Usually the sauce hard liquor.
He's on the sauce again.
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Archaic. garden vegetables eaten with meat.
verb (used with object)
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sauces,
present (3rd person singular)
-
sauced,
past participle, past
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saucing
present participle
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to dress or prepare with sauce; season.
meat well sauced.
-
to make a sauce of.
Tomatoes must be sauced while ripe.
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to give piquance or zest to.
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to make agreeable or less harsh.
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Informal. to speak impertinently or saucily to.
noun
-
any liquid or semiliquid preparation eaten with food to enhance its flavour
-
anything that adds piquancy
-
stewed fruit
-
dialect vegetables eaten with meat
-
informal impudent language or behaviour
verb
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to prepare (food) with sauce
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to add zest to
-
to make agreeable or less severe
-
informal to be saucy to
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
saucesimple
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saucessimple
-
have saucedperfect
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has saucedperfect
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am saucingprogressive
-
are saucingprogressive
-
is saucingprogressive
-
have been saucingperfect progressive
-
has been saucingperfect progressive
Past
-
saucedsimple
-
had saucedperfect
-
was saucingprogressive
-
were saucingprogressive
-
had been saucingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of sauce
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English, from Middle French, from Late Latin salsa, noun use of feminine of Latin salsus “salted,” past participle of sallere “to salt,” derivative of sāl “salt”; see also salt 1
Explanation
A sauce is a nearly-liquid or soft topping or condiment for food. You might prefer your spaghetti with tomato sauce and your broccoli with cheese sauce. The cuisine of every country and region has its own sauces, from chutney served with Indian dosas to Hollandaise sauce on eggs Benedict and caramel sauce dolloped on sticky toffee pudding. You can even use sauce as a fancy verb: "Shall I sauce the beef?" Figuratively, to sauce someone is to speak in an impudent or cheeky way.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
They both want to claim top honours, but Pierce feels he will have the edge if he can get the peppercorn sauce recipe off the chef at QPR.
From BBC ● Nov. 10, 2026
The beans bring both flavor and fiber, the sausage adds richness and heat, and the spinach practically disappears into the sauce.
From Salon ● Nov. 5, 2026
One is for quail in rose petal sauce, which Crook made for his girlfriend at the time, whose name was Clea.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 28, 2026
After we’d ordered salt-and-pepper shrimp and branzino with sauce vierge and fennel herb salad, I chatted with veteran manager Jared Deery.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 26, 2026
Tomato sauce flies off her wooden spoon, splattering the chipped yellow cabinets.
From "South of Somewhere" by Kalena Miller
A group of conservative German MEPs are also seeking a specific carve-out for meat names in snacks and sauces in separate legislation, external currently making its way through the European Parliament.
From BBC ● Nov. 6, 2026
They appear in sauces, salads, and cocktails, and even serve as colorful seasonal decorations.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 29, 2026
But there will also be white tablecloths and pasta, as well as an expanded line of sauces.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 20, 2026
Many chefs have even created their own versions, replacing the original’s rethermalized ground beef and nacho cheese sauce with fussed-over ingredients like pernil, bulgogi, birria and scratchmade salsas or sauces.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 9, 2026
I entered the kitchen to rinse out the pots, starting with the leftover Lebanon and Cairo sauces.
From "City of the Plague God" by Sarwat Chadda
Ferrell said later that he was glad to be in the back row because it meant nobody behind him got sauced.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 29, 2026
The capers themselves are fried to create a crisp garnish for the sauced asparagus.
From Washington Times ● Sep. 12, 2023
Crab Louie, created with seafood from the Chesapeake and sauced with what tastes like Thousand Island dressing, is stuffed into fragile, Lilliputian cones with creamy avocado mousse.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 10, 2023
"What distinguishes us from other traditional cuisines is that most of our dishes are sauced," says Toledo.
From Salon ● Feb. 23, 2023
"Her page. She invites you to sup with her again. There's to be a haunch of venison, she says, a brace of stuffed geese sauced with mulberries, and—" "—her daughter," Tyrion finished sourly.
From "A Clash of Kings" by George R.R. Martin
Of this generous, very pretty platter, my only sorrow was an uneven saucing, leaving one side somewhat bereft of the overall excellence.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 26, 2023
How does one cram the time capsule of an entire seasoning and saucing life into a 32-quart Igloo?
From Salon ● Aug. 14, 2022
Ms. Sarikaya laughed and then the two of them discussed whether to blanch noodles before saucing them; Ms. Olsen prefers a quick boil, while Ms. Sarikaya worries that it will leave the noddles too watery.
From New York Times ● Aug. 10, 2017
These vegan Philadelphia chef-restaurateurs are especially adept at seasoning and saucing.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 28, 2016
They talked back to subscribers, saucing off, uttering facetious remarks, and generally giving lip.
From The Hacker Crackdown, law and disorder on the electronic frontier by Bruce Sterling
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