kitchen pass
- noun
- /ˈkɪtʃən pæs/
- Jargon
- After a long week of cooking, she finally took a kitchen pass to enjoy a relaxing evening with her friends.
Examples
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He got a kitchen pass so he could join his friends for dinner.
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After a long week, she finally took a kitchen pass and ordered takeout.
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Jokingly, he said he needed a kitchen pass to enjoy a night out.
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She asked for a kitchen pass to join the party.
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Can I get a kitchen pass for tonight?
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He jokingly requested a kitchen pass to escape his cooking duties and join the movie night.
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To lighten her workload, she asked her partner for a kitchen pass and ordered some pizza instead.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'permission to temporarily leave the kitchen' is directly derivable from combining 'kitchen' (place for cooking) with 'pass' (a permit), forming a transparent noun–noun compound indicating a permit related to the kitchen. This compositional pattern is common (compare 'hall pass') and cross-linguistically intuitive, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents would readily infer the meaning.
Etymology
Kitchen pass comes from the simple image of a kitchen and a pass like a ticket or note that gives someone 'permission' to leave their work. So, if a cook is given a kitchen pass, they can step away from cooking and the phrase means 'time off' from the kitchen.