Today's Word "Grub"
Published in Vocabulary
grub \grehb\ (noun) - (Western US Slang) Plain food, 'eats,' victuals; also, a thick white larva of some insects that spends its life digging through the soil.
"That was some grub you rustled up for us tonight, Cookie; where did you dig it up?"
Speaking of grub, some of the best is the cured salmon known as gravlax, from Swedish grava "to bury" + lax "lox," named for the original process of curing it in the ground. The same root that produced "grava," turned up in Old English grybban "to dig," which ultimately became "grub." Because pigs and other animals usually grub for food, the word "grub" also became cowboy slang for "food." In Middle Dutch the same root emerged as groeve "ditch," which was borrowed by English as "groove." The Old English word for "ditch" was "graef," which today is "grave." We don't actually advocate using today's word in its first meaning: it is substandard slang originating in the speech of the American cowboy. On a cattle drive, grub was simple but hot, served up around the chuck wagon, which carried the provisions for the drive.
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