Legal Writing

What does "soup to nuts" mean?

By Pam_Nelson

An editor asked about "soup to nuts," which appeared in this story. It means from beginning to end or the whole shebang, of course, but then we wondered where the phrase comes from. 

I turned first to "The Word Detective" by Evan Morris, and he confirms what I thought, that the saying refers to the courses of a meal, which starts with soup and ends with nuts. I checked "Miss Manners' Guide to Excruciatingly Correct Behavior" and didn't find nuts as a course in an elaborate, formal dinner, but nuts are often in the dessert. Morris and others note that such a phrase is common in other languages and eras too. The Latin phrase ab ovo usque ad mala ("from the egg to the apples") describes the typical Roman meal, a Wikipedia article notes. So today the phrase could be from Loaded Chili Cheese Fries to Death By Chocolate Sundae.

The Oxford English Dictionary dates the phrase "from soup to nuts" to 1910 and calls it "U.S. colloquial."

By the way, if you like to read about word and phrase origins, you might be interested in Morris' newsletter. You can subscribe at his Web site, The Word Detective.

Full post as published by Triangle Grammar Guide on March 21, 2010 (boomark / email).