Monthly Archives: August 2021

It’s Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day today, so here is a context clues worksheet on the verb garnish. It’s used only transitively, so don’t forget your direct object: you must garnish something.

The context in this worksheet seeks to elicit from students the culinary definition of garnish, to wit, “to add decorative or savory touches to (food or drink).” To that end, it might be complementary to this trove of documents I posted a couple of years ago for building a lexicon in the culinary arts.

In any event, garnish has a complicated etymology that includes the idea of garnishing wages (though, interestingly, a definition for that act–depriving someone of earnings to settle outstanding debts–is not part of the set of definitions for garnish as a verb), and “decorating,” “furnishing,” and “embellishing.” Another definition is “to equip with accessories.”  Whatever–that’s enough garnish on this blog post.

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.