| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000. |
| |
| cook |
| |
| PRONUNCIATION: |  k k |
| VERB: | Inflected forms: cooked, cook·ing, cooks
| | TRANSITIVE VERB: | 1. To prepare (food) for eating by applying heat. 2. To prepare or treat by heating: slowly cooked the medicinal mixture. 3. Slang To alter or falsify so as to make a more favorable impression; doctor: disreputable accountants who were paid to cook the firm's books. | | INTRANSITIVE VERB: | 1. To prepare food for eating by applying heat. 2. To undergo application of heat especially for the purpose of later ingestion. 3. Slang To happen, develop, or take place: What's cooking in town? 4. Slang To proceed or perform very well: The band really got cooking after midnight. | | NOUN: | A person who prepares food for eating. | | PHRASAL VERB: | cook up Informal To fabricate; concoct: cook up an excuse. | | IDIOM: | cook (one's) goose Slang To ruin one's chances: The speeding ticket cooked his goose with his father. Her goose was cooked when she was caught cheating on the test. | | ETYMOLOGY: | Middle English coken, from coke, cook, from Old English c c, from Vulgar Latin *ccus, from Latin cocus, coquus, from coquere, to cook. See pekw- in Appendix I.
| | |
| |
| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by the Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. |
|
|
