zabaglione, n.

zabaglione
http://www.oed.com/dictionary/zabaglione_n%3Ftab%3Dmeaning_and_use
First published 1986; not fully revised

# zabaglionenoun

## Earlier version

- zabaglione in OED Second Edition (1989)

## Factsheet

### What does the noun zabaglione mean?

There is one meaning in OED's entry for the noun zabaglione. See ‘Meaning & use’ for definition, usage, and quotation evidence.

#### Entry status

OED is undergoing a continuous programme of revision to modernize and improve definitions. This entry has not yet been fully revised.

### How common is the noun zabaglione?

About 0.02occurrences per million words in modern written English

1900 | 0.0022
1910 | 0.0033
1920 | 0.004
1930 | 0.0047
1940 | 0.0065
1950 | 0.011
1960 | 0.015
1970 | 0.017
1980 | 0.018
1990 | 0.02
2000 | 0.023
2010 | 0.025

### How is the noun zabaglione pronounced?

#### British English

/ˌzab(a)lˈjəʊni/
zab-al-YOH-nee
/ˌzab(a)lˈjəʊneɪ/
zab-al-YOH-nay

#### U.S. English

/ˌzɑbəlˈjoʊni/
zah-buhl-YOH-nee
/ˌzɑbəlˈjoʊneɪ/
zah-buhl-YOH-nay

### Where does the noun zabaglione come from?

Earliest known use

1890s

The earliest known use of the noun zabaglione is in the 1890s.

OED's earliest evidence for zabaglione is from 1899, in the writing of M. Ninet.

zabaglione is a borrowing from Italian.

### Nearby entries

1. 73, n. 1855–
2. 78, n. 1949–
3. 800 number, n. 1971–
4. 900 number, n. 1977–
5. 911, n. 1968–
6. 999, n. 1937–
7. Z, n. Old English–
8. 'Z, adj.
9. za, n. 1968–
10. zaatar, n. 1917–
11. zabaglione, n.1899–
12. zabernism, n. 1916–21
13. zabernize, v. 1914
14. zabra, n. 1523–
15. zabuton, n. 1879–
16. zac, n. 1898–
17. 'zackly | 'zactly, adv. 1886–
18. zad, n. 1669–
19. Zadokite, n. & adj. 1910–
20. zadruga, n. 1887–
21. zaffre | zaffer, n. 1662–

## Etymology

### Summary

A borrowing from Italian.
< Italian, perhaps ultimately < late Latin sabaia an Illyrian drink…
< Italian, perhaps ultimately < late Latin sabaia an Illyrian drink.

### Notes

OED Supplement (1986) gives the pronunciation as (zabaly o·ne) /zɑːbɑːˈljəʊneɪ/ .

## Meaning & use

1. 1899–
   A dessert consisting of egg yolks, sugar, and (usually Marsala) wine, whipped to a frothy texture over a gentle heat and served either hot or cold. Cf. sabayon n.
   1. 1899

      > Sambaglione.—Put into a saucepan about six new-laid eggs, and two sherry-glassfuls of Madeira.

      M. Ninet, Dainty Meals for Small Households xiv. xiv. 223
   2. 1901

      > Zabajone is a kind of syllabub.

      W. G. Waters, Cook's Decameron 175/1
   3. 1901

      > Iced zabajone.

      W. G. Waters, Cook's Decameron 175/2 (heading)
   4. 1914

      > This was followed by a glass of zabaione for dessert.

      C. E. Edwards, Bohemian in San Francisco 104
   5. 1917

      > We dined off onion pilaff, and sponge-cake of maize flour with zabayone.

      Blackwood's Magazine January 111/1
   6. 1924

      > She had instructed Roberto to beat up some eggs..that she might make zabaglione.

      M. Kennedy, Constant Nymph xvi. 222
   7. 1932

      > At a single opening of the book we find..zambaglione (the reviewer would prefer to omit the lemon-juice but to add a pinch of yeast).

      Times Literary Supplement 10 November 836/4
   8. 1958

      > A nation that is content at midday with shepherd's pie..must dine out off kebabs and zabagliones.

      Times 2 October 11/4
   9. 1960

      > A copper zabaglione pan.

      House & Garden May 94/3
   10. 1974

       > The best-known Italian sweet, zabaglione.

       Country Life 25 April 1006/1
   11. 1981

       > Zac ordered blackberry, peach, pineapple [ices] and zabaione.

       R. Airth, Once a Spy ix. 100
   12. 1984

       > Whatever food is mentioned, from aubergines to zabaglione, they are ready to garnish it with some unsavoury gobbet of introductory junk music.

       Listener 1 November 42/2
   food and cooking
   1. syllabub?1562–
      A drink or dish made of milk (frequently as drawn from the cow) or cream, curdled by the admixture of wine, cider, or other acid, and often…
   2. sillibouk 1574–
      A syllabub. Also attributive.
   3. syllab?a1600
      Apparently: a potion or mixture of herbs.
   4. merribowk 1611–1865
      = posset, n. 1.
   5. whip-syllabub 1740–
      Whipped syllabub; also figurative.
   6. zabaglione 1899–
      A dessert consisting of egg yolks, sugar, and (usually Marsala) wine, whipped to a frothy texture over a gentle heat and served either hot or…
   View in Historical Thesaurus

## Pronunciation

### British English

/ˌzab(a)lˈjəʊni/
zab-al-YOH-nee
/ˌzab(a)lˈjəʊneɪ/
zab-al-YOH-nay

### U.S. English

/ˌzɑbəlˈjoʊni/
zah-buhl-YOH-nee
/ˌzɑbəlˈjoʊneɪ/
zah-buhl-YOH-nay

####

##### Consonants

- ppea
- ttea
- kkey
- bbuy
- ddye
- ɡguy
- tʃchore
- dʒjay
- ffore
- θthaw
- ssore
- ʃshore
- vvee
- ðthee
- zzee
- ʒbeige
- xloch
- hhay
- llay
- ɬrhingyll
- rray
- wway
- jyore
- mmay
- nnay
- ŋsing

Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used, hence /ˈpɛtl/ but /ˈpɛtl̩i/.

##### Vowels

- iːfleece
- ihappy
- ɪkit
- ɛdress
- atrap, bath
- ɑːstart, palm, bath
- ɒlot
- ɔːthought, force
- ʌstrut
- ʊfoot
- uːgoose
- əletter
- əːnurse
- ɪənear
- ɛːsquare
- ʊəcure
- eɪface
- ʌɪpride
- aʊmouth
- əʊgoat
- ɔɪvoice
- ãgratin
- ɒ̃salon
- ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)
- ᵿ(/ʊ/-/ə/)

##### Other symbols

- The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
- The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
- Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.

View the pronunciation model here.

####

##### Consonants

- ppea
- ttea
- kkey
- bbuy
- ddye*
- ɡguy
- tʃchore
- dʒjay
- ffore
- θthaw
- ssore
- ʃshore
- vvee
- ðthee
- zzee
- ʒbeige
- xloch
- hhay
- llay
- rray
- wway
- jyore
- mmay
- nnay
- ŋsing

* /d/ also represents a 'tapped' /t/ as in

Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used, hence /ˈpɛd(ə)l/ but /ˈpɛdl̩i/.

##### Vowels

- ifleece, happy
- ɪkit
- ɛdress
- ætrap, bath
- ɑlot, palm, cloth, thought
- ɑrstart
- ɔcloth, thought
- ɔrnorth, force
- ʊfoot
- ugoose
- əstrut, comma
- ərnurse, letter
- ɪ(ə)rnear
- ɛ(ə)rsquare
- ʊ(ə)rcure
- eɪface
- aɪpride
- aʊmouth
- oʊgoat
- ɔɪvoice
- ɑ̃gratin
- æ̃salon
- ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)
- ᵿ(/ʊ/-/ə/)

##### Other symbols

- The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
- The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
- Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.

View the pronunciation model here.

####

Simple text respell breaks words into syllables, separated by a hyphen. The syllable which carries the primary stress is written in capital letters. This key covers both British and U.S. English Simple Text Respell.

##### Consonants

b, d, f, h, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w and z have their standard English values

- gguy
- jjay
- yyore
- chchore
- khloch
- shshore
- ththaw
- dhthee
- zhbeige

##### Vowels

- atrap
- ahpalm
- airsquare
- arstart
- arrcarry (British only)
- awthought
- ayface
- a(ng)gratin
- edress
- eefleece
- eerdeer
- errmerry
- ikit
- ighpride
- irrmirror
- olot (British only)
- ohgoat
- oogoose
- oorcure
- orforce
- orrsorry (British only)
- owmouth
- oyvoice
- o(ng)salon
- ustrut
- uhletter
- urnurse
- urrhurry
- uufoot

## Forms

### Variant forms

Also sambaglione, zabaione, etc.

## Frequency

zabaglione typically occurs about 0.02 times per million words in modern written English.

zabaglione is in frequency band 3, which contains words occurring between 0.01 and 0.1 times per million words in modern written English. More about OED's frequency bands

Frequency data is computed programmatically, and should be regarded as an estimate.

### Frequency of zabaglione, n., 1900–2010

* Occurrences per million words in written English

Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010.

The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations.

For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies.

Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus.

Decade | Frequency per million words
--- | ---
1900 | 0.0022
1910 | 0.0033
1920 | 0.004
1930 | 0.0047
1940 | 0.0065
1950 | 0.011
1960 | 0.015
1970 | 0.017
1980 | 0.018
1990 | 0.02
2000 | 0.023
2010 | 0.025

zabaglione, n. was first published in 1986; not fully revised.

zabaglione, n. was last modified in December 2024.