Meanings
mother sauces1
- pluralplural of mother sauce
mother sauces2
singular mother sauce
- pluralplural normallycookingThe set of 5 sauces that are the basis of traditional French cuisine.
“The problem with the classic mother sauces,” according to the chef Michael Solomonov, who cooks modern Israeli food at his restaurant Zahav in Philadelphia, “is that most of them are made with roux. Now, roux is out. Nobody uses it, except when you’re making macaroni and cheese.”
2016 August 2, Samin Nosrat, “Five Sauces for the Modern Cook”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 05 Aug 2016
Origin
mother sauces · noun
See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.
Full word history & related roots →mother sauces · noun
- Frenchsauces mères
- Englishmother sauces
Sauces considered mother sauces. In order (left to right, top to bottom): béchamel, espagnole, tomato, velouté and hollandaise. Calque of French sauces mères, coined by Marie-Antoine Carême, popularized by Auguste Escoffier.
More words from French
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
mother sauces. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/mother%20sauces
“mother sauces.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/mother%20sauces. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “mother sauces,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/mother%20sauces.
Source: mother sauces on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.