kitchen

Definition

A room or area for preparing food.

Etymology

From Middle English kychyn, kytchen, kichene, küchen, from Old English cyċen, cyċene, from Proto-West Germanic *kukinā, a borrowing from Late Latin cocīna, from earlier coquīna (“kitchen; cuisine”), from coquō (“to cook”), from Proto-Indo-European *pekʷ- (“to cook, become ripe”). In other languages, the cognate term often refers both to the room and the type of cooking. In English, the distinction is generally made via the etymological twins kitchen (“room”) (Latin via Germanic) and cuisine (“type of cooking”) (Latin via French).

Example Sentences

• "We cook in the kitchen."
• "Everything a living animal could do to destroy and to desecrate bed and walls had been done. […] A canister of flour from the kitchen had been thrown at the looking-glass and lay like trampled snow over the remains of a decent blue suit with the lining ripped out which lay on top of the ruin of a plastic wardrobe."
• "I always leave the stuff piled up, piled up in the sink / But you will always find him in the kitchen at parties"