from soup to nuts

English

Alternative forms

• soup to nuts

Etymology

From the order of courses in a formal full-course dinner, which typically begins with soup and ends with a dessert such as nuts.

Pronunciation

• Audio (General Australian):

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Prepositional phrase

from soup to nuts (US)

1. (literally) From the first course of a meal to the last.
2. (informal, figuratively) From start to finish, from beginning to end; throughout.

   Synonyms: from A to Z, from soda to hock, from aardvark to zymurgy

   We went through the whole agenda, from soup to nuts.

   • 1960, P. G. Wodehouse, Jeeves in the Offing, chapter VII:

     [That cat] is a broken reed to lean on in the matter of catching mice. My own acquaintance with him is a longstanding one, and I have come to know his psychology from soup to nuts. He hasn't caught a mouse since he was a slip of a kitten. Except when eating, he does nothing but sleep.

Related terms

• soup-to-nuts

Translations

from the first course of the meal to the last

Polish: od A do Z (pl) Serbo-Croatian: od predjela do deserta Spanish: desde [la] sopa a [las] nueces

from beginning to end

Dutch: Van A tot Z. French: de A à Z (fr) Latin: ab ovo usque ad mala Polish: od A do Z (pl) Serbo-Croatian: od glave do repa Spanish: desde [el] comienzo hasta [el] fin

Further reading

• “from soup to nuts”, in Cambridge English Dictionary, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1999–present.
• “from soup to nuts”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• from soup to nuts on Wikipedia.Wikipedia