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shortening

 [shawrt-ning, shawr-tn-ing]   Origin

short·en·ing

   [shawrt-ning, shawr-tn-ing]
noun
1.
butter, lard, or other fat, used to make pastry, bread, etc., short.
2.
Phonetics. the act, process, or an instance of making or becoming short.
3.
Linguistics.
a.
the act or process of dropping one or more syllables from a word or phrase to form a shorter word with the same meaning, as in forming piano from pianoforte or phone from telephone.
b.
clipped form.
Origin:
1535–45; shorten + -ing1

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Shortening is always a great word to know.
So is clear. Does it mean:
For the 'l' sound, having front-vowel resonance; situated before a vowel in the same syllable; produced without frication or aspiration
a speech sound produced without occluding, diverting, or obstructing the flow of air from the lungs
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Dictionary.com Unabridged

short·en

   [shawr-tn]
verb (used with object)
1.
to make short or shorter.
2.
to reduce, decrease, take in, etc.: to shorten sail.
3.
to make (pastry, bread, etc.) short, as with butter or other fat.
4.
Sports. choke (def. 8).
verb (used without object)
5.
to become short or shorter.
6.
(of odds) to decrease.
Origin:
1505–15; short + -en1

Related forms
short·en·er, noun
o·ver·short·en, verb
pre·short·en, verb (used with object)
re·short·en, verb
un·der·short·en, verb (used with object)
EXPAND
un·short·en, adjective
COLLAPSE

Synonyms
1. condense, lessen, limit, restrict. Shorten, abbreviate, abridge, curtail mean to make shorter or briefer. Shorten is a general word meaning to make less in extent or duration: to shorten a dress, a prisoner's sentence. The other three terms suggest methods of shortening. To abbreviate is to make shorter by omission or contraction: to abbreviate a word. To abridge is to reduce in length or size by condensing, summarizing, and the like: to abridge a document. Curtail suggests deprivation and lack of completeness because of omitting some part: to curtail an explanation. 5. contract, lessen.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
Cite This Source Link To shortening
Collins
World English Dictionary
shortening (ˈʃɔːtənɪŋ)
 
—n
butter, lard, or other fat, used in a dough, cake mixture, etc, to make the mixture short

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
Cite This Source
Etymonline
Word Origin & History

shortening
"butter or other fat used in baking," 1796, from shorten "make crumbly" (1733), from short in the secondary sense of "easily crumbled" (c.1430), which perhaps arose via the notion of "having short fibers." This is also the sense behind shortbread (1801) and shortcake (1594).
EXPAND

shorten
1510s, from short (adj.); the earlier form of the verb was simply short, from O.E. sceortian "to grow short," gescyrtan "to make short."
COLLAPSE
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
Cite This Source
Encyclopedia Britannica
Encyclopedia

shortening

fats and oils of animal or vegetable origin used in most doughs and batters to impart crisp and crumbly texture to baked products and to increase the plasticity, or workability, of doughs. Important commercial shortenings include butter, lard, vegetable oils, processed shortenings, and margarine. For most baking purposes, desirable characteristics include bland or pleasant flavour; freedom from objectionable odour; light or clear colour; a high degree of plasticity; long storage life; and good shortening power, or ability to weaken and lubricate the structure of baked products to produce tenderness. Firm fats produce flaky pastry; oils yield more compact pastry. The proportion of shortening in doughs and batters varies according to the product, with breads and rolls containing about 1-2 percent, cakes containing 10-20 percent, and piecrusts containing over 30 percent. Increasing shortening proportions increases tenderness, but very high proportions may cause cakes to fall

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Encyclopedia Britannica, 2008. Encyclopedia Britannica Online.
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