Meanings
present singular third person cuts the mustard · participle present cutting the mustard
- idiomaticintransitiveTo achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough; to suffice.
Give me the bigger hammer. This little one just doesn’t cut the mustard.
2 more examples
By nature and doctrines I am addicted to the habit of discovering choice places wherein to feed. So I looked around and found a proposition that exactly cut the mustard. I found a restaurant tent just opened up by an outfit that had drifted in on the tail of the boom.
1907, O. Henry [pseudonym; William Sydney Porter], “Cupid à la Carte”, in Heart of the West, New York, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company for Review of Reviews Co., →OCLC, page 163[I]f a man gets a loan and over a period of years he has demonstrated that he cannot cut the mustard, how is he going to demonstrate it in a period of 12 months?
1940 March 21, Fred Cummings, committee member, “Statement of Albert S. Goss [Former Land Bank Commissioner, Farm Credit Administration, Washington, D.C.]—Resumed”, in Farm Credit Legislation: Hearing before the Committee on Agriculture, Committee on Agriculture, House of Representatives, Seventy-sixth Congress, Third Session on H.R. 8748 […], Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 194Synonyms: be up to par, be up to scratch, be up to snuff, cut it, hack it, make the cut, make the grade, measure up
Synonyms & antonyms
verbTo achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough; to suffice.
Origin
From cut (“to exhibit (a quality)”) + the + mustard (“(originally US slang) something adding spice or zest to a situation; something setting the standard”).
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Arabic يفي بالغرض
- يفي بالغرضto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
Esperanto tranĉi la mustardon
- tranĉi la mustardonto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
Finnish kelvata, riittää
- kelvatato achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
- riittääto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
French faire le poids
- faire le poidsto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
German es bringen
- es bringento achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
Hungarian elég jó, megjárja
- elég jóto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
- megjárjato achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
- tűrhetőto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
Polish wystarczać, wystarczyć
- wystarczaćto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
- wystarczyćto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
Russian потянуть
- потянуть (potjanutʹ)to achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
Swedish duga, räcka till
- dugato achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
- räcka tillto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
Turkish kesmek
- kesmekto achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
Welsh bod yn ddigon da
- bod yn ddigon dato achieve the expected standard; to be effective or good enough — see also suffice
Rhymes & wordplay
Rhymes with cut the mustard
All rhymes →Cite this entry
cut the mustard. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cut%20the%20mustard
“cut the mustard.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cut%20the%20mustard. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “cut the mustard,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/cut%20the%20mustard.
Source: cut the mustard on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.