Grilling

Part of speech: verb

Pronunciation: /ˈɡɹɪlɪŋ/

Definitions

1. The process of cooking food by exposing it to direct heat, usually on a grill ; a rigorous or severe questioning to obtain information or confessions
2. A method of preparing food by applying direct flame or heat underneath the item ; a thorough and demanding interrogation often to test truthfulness or knowledge
3. The action of roasting food over an open flame or hot surface ; a forceful verbal examination aimed at uncovering facts or answers

Etymology: The verb "grill" for cooking over an open flame arrived in English in 1655, borrowed from French "gril", which meant "gridiron" and came down from Old French "greïl" and "graïlle", "grate, grating". Those trace back to Latin "crātīcula", a diminutive of "crātis", "hurdle" or "wickerwork". So the cooking sense comes from the metal grid that holds the food, not from the act of heating it. "Grate", "grid", "griddle" and "gridiron" all descend from the same Latin root. The interrogation sense is a different word entirely, and it is far older. It descends from Old English "grillan" and "griellan", "to annoy, vex, offend", which came from a Proto-West Germanic root meaning "to shout, make angry". Middle English kept the sense of provoking or angering someone, and that irritating, pestering idea is the ancestor of the modern meaning of subjecting someone to a sharp, persistent questioning. Because the two senses come from unrelated roots that happened to converge on the same spelling, the modern verb carries both histories at once. Its meanings were never linked in origin, only in form.

Synonyms: barbecuing, broiling