browning

Pluralbrownings

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of brown.

   She spent ten minutes browning the butter until it smelled nutty.

   The apple slices began browning the moment they hit the air.

   Note

   The verb works in both directions. You can be browning the butter, or the apples can be browning on their own. With food, the transitive use usually means cooking until the surface colors. One use needs care. When it describes a region's population turning more Hispanic or Latino, the verb is derogatory slang. As a gerund it overlaps with the noun for the process.

2. 2
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The act or process of giving something a brown color, as to gun barrels or cooked food.

   The browning of gun barrels protects the steel from rust.

   Careful browning of the onions builds the base of the sauce.

3. 3
   nouncountable or uncountable

   Any of various preparations used to give a brown color to gravy, leather, and similar materials.

   The cook keeps a bottle of browning on hand for darkening pale sauces.

   A coat of browning gave the saddle its deep, weathered finish.

4. 4
   nounJamaicacountable

   A person with brown-colored skin.

   The traveler wrote of a browning who offered him shelter for the night.

   The census taker counted three brownings among the household that year.

   Note

   Jamaican speech has a whole vocabulary of skin shade, and this word belongs to it. Mackareo's "Peng Ting" (2017) runs through the whole set in one breath, from white to light to dark to brown. Here browning sits between light and dark. Because the term is tied to Jamaican usage, it is best kept in that setting rather than treated as a neutral, general description of a person.

5. 5
   nouncountable or uncountable

   In plastering, the smooth coat of brown mortar, normally the second, that prepares a surface for the finishing coat of plaster.

   After the scratch coat cured, the mason troweled on the browning to even the wall.

   The browning must be level before the finish plaster goes on.

   Note

   The trade names this layer for its color. In three-coat plastering, the browning sits between the rough scratch coat and the thin finish, and its job is flatness rather than looks. Masons trowel on the browning and check it for level, because any hollow or ridge left in it will show through the finish plaster laid over it.

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