GARNISH

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does garnish mean? 

• GARNISH (noun)
  The noun GARNISH has 2 senses:

1. something (such as parsley) added to a dish for flavor or decoration

2. any decoration added as a trimming or adornment

  Familiarity information: GARNISH used as a noun is rare.

• GARNISH (verb)
  The verb GARNISH has 2 senses:

1. take a debtor's wages on legal orders, such as for child support

2. decorate (food), as with parsley or other ornamental foods

  Familiarity information: GARNISH used as a verb is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• GARNISH (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Something (such as parsley) added to a dish for flavor or decoration

Classified under:

Nouns denoting foods and drinks

Hypernyms ("garnish" is a kind of...):

decoration; ornament; ornamentation (something used to beautify)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "garnish"):

topping (a flavorful addition on top of a dish)

Derivation:

garnish (decorate (food), as with parsley or other ornamental foods)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Any decoration added as a trimming or adornment

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("garnish" is a kind of...):

decoration; ornament; ornamentation (something used to beautify)

Derivation:

garnish (decorate (food), as with parsley or other ornamental foods)

• GARNISH (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they garnish    ... he / she / it garnishes   
Past simple: garnished   
Past participle: garnished   
-ing form: garnishing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Take a debtor's wages on legal orders, such as for child support

Classified under:

Verbs of buying, selling, owning

Synonyms:

garnish; garnishee

Context example:

His employer garnished his wages in order to pay his debt

Hypernyms (to "garnish" is one way to...):

attach; confiscate; impound; seize; sequester (take temporary possession of as a security, by legal authority)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

garnishment (a court order to an employer to withhold all or part of an employee's wages and to send the money to the court or to the person who won a lawsuit against the employee)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Decorate (food), as with parsley or other ornamental foods

Classified under:

Verbs of sewing, baking, painting, performing

Synonyms:

dress; garnish; trim

Hypernyms (to "garnish" is one way to...):

adorn; beautify; decorate; embellish; grace; ornament (make more attractive by adding ornament, colour, etc.)

Verb group:

dress; dress out (kill and prepare for market or consumption)

dress (put a dressing on)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Sentence example:

The chefs garnish the vegetables

Derivation:

garnish (any decoration added as a trimming or adornment)

garnish (something (such as parsley) added to a dish for flavor or decoration)

 Context examples 

It was all in the same extravagant vein, garnished with many senseless oaths; but I observed this difference, that, whereas my uncle and Sheridan had something of humour in their exaggeration, Francis tended always to ill-nature, and the Prince to self-glorification.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

From school duties she was exonerated: Mrs. Fairfax had pressed me into her service, and I was all day in the storeroom, helping (or hindering) her and the cook; learning to make custards and cheese-cakes and French pastry, to truss game and garnish desert-dishes.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

On buffet tables, garnished with glistening hors-d'oeuvre, spiced baked hams crowded against salads of harlequin designs and pastry pigs and turkeys bewitched to a dark gold.

(The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald)

His bedroom was the simplest room of all—except where the dresser was garnished with a toilet set of pure dull gold. Daisy took the brush with delight and smoothed her hair, whereupon Gatsby sat down and shaded his eyes and began to laugh.

(The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald)