kitchen-sink

adjective

kitch·​en-sink ˈki-chən-ˈsiŋk How to pronounce kitchen-sink (audio)
1
: being or made up of a hodgepodge of disparate elements or ingredients
2
chiefly British : portraying or emphasizing the squalid aspects of modern life
the kitchen-sink realism of contemporary British dramaCurrent Biography

Examples of kitchen-sink in a Sentence

many of the bartender's recipes are for kitchen-sink cocktails that sound like they would be a waste of good liquor
Recent Examples on the Web
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Bay was just collecting the check at this point, and the kitchen-sink approach to mythology — now factoring in the staff of Merlin, Stonehenge, a new Über-villain named Unicron, the aforementioned Witwiccan connection to Harriet Tubman — made for something too bloated to even be fun. Jordan Crucchiola, Vulture, 25 Sep. 2024 That strange harmony, made all the stranger for its place in a kitchen-sink tragedy about the myopia of capital punishment, rattles your soul from the inside out. Indiewire Staff, IndieWire, 12 Aug. 2024 Lawmakers should take a kitchen-sink approach to housing, report says There's no single solution that will eliminate the construction bottleneck, the report found. Genevieve Redsten, Journal Sentinel, 25 July 2024 Greene took a kitchen-sink approach to her hectoring. Robin Abcarian, The Mercury News, 11 June 2024 Bird After dipping into documentary (Cow), television (Transparent, Big Little Lies) and U.S. youth subculture (American Honey), Andrea Arnold’s new feature appears to be a return to the Brit kitchen-sink realism of her breakout works Red Road and Fish Tank. David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter, 14 May 2024 Made on a shoestring budget and shot over a little more than a week, it was lapped up for giving a uniquely dark and hilarious twist to the standard gangster flick while adding splashes of U.K. kitchen-sink social realism into the mix. Alex Ritman, Variety, 27 Feb. 2024 The director is proving that Denmark can produce more than kitchen-sink dramas. Max Gao, Los Angeles Times, 29 Nov. 2023 Written and directed by first-time filmmaker Charlotte Regan, this quirky slice of life seeks to subvert nearly every expectation set up by what was once called kitchen-sink drama, with its monochrome palette and hangdog naturalism. Ann Hornaday, Washington Post, 18 Sep. 2023

Word History

First Known Use

1954, in the meaning defined at sense 2

Time Traveler
The first known use of kitchen-sink was in 1954

Dictionary Entries Near kitchen-sink

Cite this Entry

“Kitchen-sink.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/kitchen-sink. Accessed 3 Dec. 2024.

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
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