lard
/lɑːd
/noun [mass noun]
1Fat from the abdomen of a pig that is rendered and clarified for use in cooking.The gravy was made from lard, chicken stock chili powder and cumin....
- I love making pastry, bringing my hands high up in the air as I rub the tiny cubes of cold butter and soft lard into the flour.
- A hard, solid fat such as lard or suet is most effective here.
1.1 informal Excess fat in a person: I’ve got to give up fags and shift some lard he’s just a tub of lard...
- I'm rolling in blubber, drowning in my own lard.
- Prof Barnett and his colleagues have been at the forefront of research into the understanding that fat cells around the waistline are not passive lumps of lard but are highly active, pumping out proteins and hormones.
- These are essentially sexless mutants who don't waste their energy on looking for Mr or Mrs Right for some fun in the spawning season but devote their instincts on overeating and laying on the lard.
verb [with object]
1Insert strips of fat or bacon in (meat) before cooking: he larded the joint with garlic and anchovies...
- The meat is generally larded for this, and many consider it is best slightly underdone.
- For the sweetbreads, place the sweetbreads on a cutting board and, using a thin larding needle, lard with smoked bacon.
- For the scallops, place the scallops on a cutting board and, using a thin larding needle, lard each scallop with five strips of truffles.
1.1Smear or cover (a foodstuff) with lard or fat to prevent it drying out during storage: farmhouse cheeses are dipped in wax or larded...
- Mary has a fondness for Malpeque oysters; lards her chowder with double-smoked bacon, the way they fix it at Pearl; and accompanies her rolls (clam, lobster) with tall thatches of fried string potatoes.
2 (usually be larded with) Embellish (talk or writing) with an excessive number of esoteric or technical expressions: his conversation is larded with quotations from Coleridge...
- Listen to children when they speak and you'll be taken aback by the throw-away phrases that lard every conversation.
- By chance, Ch'ien makes this statement in a discussion of the Chinese translations of Ezra Pound, which may explain why the sentence is primarily in German and why the essay is larded with quotations from other European languages.
- These thick volumes, stuffed with tables and larded with long quotations in Greek and Hebrew, offered their readers long analyses of the dates of world history and the development of every imaginable calendar.
2.1Cover or fill thickly or excessively: the pages were larded with corrections and crossings-out...
- True, the veterans spent the better part of six decades larding the hall with mediocre ballplayers who, not coincidentally, happened to be former teammates, friends, and acquaintances.
- Collectors have come to expect and respect SWV for putting their all into each release, larding it with as much added value as possible.
- Lobbyists grew adept at larding ambitious legislation with special-interest provisions.
Derivatives
lardy
/ adjective (lardier, lardiest) ...- Similarly, my chicken tikka balti was tender and sizzling, the balti sauce sharp and tangy rather than a bland, lardy stew as is often the case, and the vegetable pilau rice we both had was full of tasty veg.
- We both opt for the lardy full Scottish breakfast option, but judging by the smell (and look, because I am staring at someone else's table) of the locally smoked kippers, they would be equally as satisfying.
- If we want to stop western obesity, we can either change our entire sedentary life style, all take loads of amphetamines or get someone to invent really nice, tasty, fast food that isn't lardy as hell.
Origin
Middle English (also denoting fat bacon or pork): from Old French 'bacon', from Latin lardum, laridum, related to Greek larinos 'fat'.