stretch

Definition

To make insufficient ingredients cover more portions than originally planned, usually through creative dilution or portion reduction. The culinary equivalent of loaves and fishes, but with more anxiety.

Example Usage

We're running low on risotto—I need you to stretch what's left for six more orders.

Origin

General restaurant kitchen term for extending resources

Fun Fact

Master chefs can stretch ingredients so skillfully that guests never notice their portion is 85% of the original size—it's basically kitchen magic.

Source: Restaurant kitchen management slang

Related Terms

Intermediate

bury

When you're so overwhelmed with orders that new tickets might as well be shoveling dirt on your grave. The state of being beyond 'in the weeds' and approaching total system failure.

🍳 Food / Culinary

Beginner

concoction

Any culinary creation assembled from multiple ingredients, typically implying either experimental genius or questionable judgment. It's what you call your dish when you're not quite sure it deserves to be called a recipe yet. The term provides plausible deniability—if it's delicious, you're innovative; if it's terrible, well, it was just a concoction.

🍳 Food / Culinary

Beginner

spider

A wire-mesh skimming tool with a long handle used to retrieve items from hot oil or boiling water. Named for its web-like basket, not because it catches anything crawly.

🍳 Food / Culinary

Intermediate

crème fraîche

Thick, tangy cultured cream with about 30% butterfat that won't curdle when heated, unlike its temperamental cousin sour cream. The French answer to the question 'how do we make cream even better?'

🍳 Food / Culinary

Beginner

kill the heat

To turn off a burner or oven, usually shouted in panic when something is seconds away from burning. The culinary version of hitting the brakes.

🍳 Food / Culinary

Intermediate

Palate Cleanser

A small, neutral-flavored bite served between courses to reset your taste buds. Usually a tiny sorbet that exists to remind you that you're eating at a place where meals have 'courses' and your credit card is about to have a really bad night.

🍳 Food / Culinary

Translate This Term

See “stretch” in Corporate Speak, Gen-Z Slang, Pirate Speak, and more.

Try the Translator

Share This Term

Post on X Share on Facebook Share on LinkedIn

Discover a Term

Beginner

TGNC

A person who identifies as TGNC istransand (or) gender non-conforming, which means they do not submit to expectations pl...