mother sauce

noun

plural mother sauces
: a simple sauce that is often used as the base for other sauces
Known as a mother sauce, béchamel can be modified by simply adding cheese, preferably a hard cheese like Gruyere or Swiss. With that and a pinch of nutmeg, you have a mornay sauce.David Campiche
Any chef worth her salt can write a lengthy book on the French mother sauces. (There are lots of other mother sauces cooked in countries that are not-France, but that's another book).Julie Cross

Examples of mother sauce in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web In the red pizza section find the Pisa Lisa made with mother sauce, provolone-mozzarella, picante peppers, Calabrese sausage, soppressata salami, prosciutto di Parma and spicy coppa. Bahar Anooshahr, The Arizona Republic, 12 Feb. 2024

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'mother sauce.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Etymology

translation of French sauce-mère

First Known Use

1892, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of mother sauce was in 1892

Dictionary Entries Near mother sauce

Cite this Entry

“Mother sauce.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/mother%20sauce. Accessed 5 Nov. 2024.

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