sauce / sôs/ • n. 1. thick liquid served with food, usually savory dishes, to add moistness and flavor: tomato sauce. ∎  stewed fruit, esp. apples, eaten as dessert or used as a garnish.2. (the sauce) inf. alcoholic drink: she's been on the sauce for years.• v. [tr.] 1. (usu. be sauced) provide a sauce for (something); season with a sauce. ∎ fig. make more interesting and exciting.2. inf. be rude or impudent to (someone).ORIGIN: Middle English: from Old French, based on Latin salsus ‘salted,’ past participle of salere ‘to salt,’ from sal ‘salt.’.

sauce Used to flavour, coat, or accompany a dish, or may be used in the cooking to bind ingredients together; may be sweet or savoury. Thick sauces may be: (1)roux sauces based on flour heated with fat;(2)thickened with starch (arrowroot, cornflour, custard powder) or modified starch (gravy granules, thickening granules);(3)thickened with egg (Hollandaise sauce, custard);(4)thickened by reduction.

sauce liquid preparation taken as a relish with articles of food XIV; piquant addition XVI; (prob. from saucy) †impudent person XVI; impudence XIX. — (O)F. sauce :- Rom. *salsa, sb. use of fem. of L. salsus salted.
Hence sauce vb. season XV; †belabour, rebuke XVI; address impertinently XIX. saucy (-Y1) †savoury; insolent towards superiors XVI; (of a ship or boat) †rashly venturous XVI, smart XIX.

sauce what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander proverbial saying, late 17th century; meaning that what is suitable for a woman is also suitable for a man, but now sometimes used in wider contexts.

See also hunger is the best sauce.