Custard

How to spell custard

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce custard

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does custard mean?

1. nounA sweet sauce or set dessert made from milk or cream and eggs, often thickened and served warm or cold.

Custard in a sentence

• She poured warm custard over the apple crumble.

• The recipe calls for a thick layer of custard between the sponge and the cream.

Where does custard come from?

Language of origin: French

Custard comes from the Middle English word 'custade', the name for a kind of open pie or tart that was baked with a crust. That word was borrowed from the Old French 'crustade', meaning a tart enclosed in a crust, which traces back to the Latin 'crusta', meaning 'crust' or 'hard shell'. Originally the word described the pastry case itself, but over time the meaning shifted to the rich, set filling of beaten eggs and milk that the case held, and finally to the sweet egg-and-milk sauce we know today. Notice that the original word kept the 'r' of 'crust' (crustade), but English dropped it through a sound change, leaving the smoother 'custard'; that lost 'r' is the surprising link back to its pastry-crust ancestor. The same Latin 'crusta' still survives in everyday English words such as 'crust' and 'crustacean'.

How the word is built

• cust- (from Latin crusta: crust, shell)
• -ard (noun suffix)