Dictionary

gumbo en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /ˈɡʌm.boʊ/ (General-American)

Etymology

Etymology tree Kimbundu ingomboder. French gombobor. ▲ French gombo Louisiana Creole gombobor. English gumbo Borrowed from Louisiana French gombo, possibly via Louisiana Creole gombo, from Kimbundu ingombo, plural of kingombo (“okra”); compare Portuguese quingombó.

Meanings

1. (countable) Synonym of okra: the plant or its edible capsules.
2. (countable) A soup or stew popular in Louisiana, consisting of a strong stock, meat or shellfish, a thickener (often okra), and the "Holy Trinity" of celery, bell peppers, and onions.
3. (uncountable) A fine silty soil that when wet becomes very thick and heavy.
   • The team stuck fast in the black muck, and every effort to extricate them served only to imbed them more hopelessly in the sticky gumbo. 1909, Ralph Connor, chapter 11, in The Foreigner:
   • There are no poorer roads in all the United States than the "gumbo" roads of the south—gumbo being the name give a certain kind of mud or clay that is particularly sticky, clings tenaciously, seems to have no bottom, and will not support any weight. 1914 April, “Making Good Roads by Firing Poor Ones”, in Popular Mechanics, page 567:
   • The red gumbo soil uttered ugly sucking sounds at the touch of a man's boot. 1950 July 3, “Labor: Trouble at Lowland”, in Time:

Forms

Deriveds

gumbo limbo · gumbo z'herbes

Synonyms

okra

Translations (2)

fr gombo (soup or stew) · lou gombo (soup or stew)