Question:medium

Choose the word that is nearest in meaning to the word given in capital letters.

GARNISH

Show Hint

Garnish means to decorate, especially food; garner is a sound-alike trap meaning to gather or collect.
Updated On: Jul 13, 2026
  • Paint
  • Garner
  • Adorn
  • Abuse
Show Solution

The Correct Option is C

Solution and Explanation

Step 1: Understanding the Concept:
"Garnish" is most familiar from cooking, where it means to decorate a finished dish with a small extra item, like a sprig of mint or a slice of lemon, to make it look more appealing.

Step 2: Key Formula or Approach:
When two options in a vocabulary question look or sound almost alike, such as "garnish" and "garner" here, treat that as a warning sign and check each word's actual meaning separately instead of relying on how similar they look.

Step 3: Detailed Explanation:
Garner actually means to gather or store up, as in "garner praise" or "garner votes". Despite its similarity in spelling to garnish, its meaning is completely different, so it is a distractor.
Paint refers to applying colour with a brush, which is only one narrow technique and not a general word for decorating.
Abuse means to mistreat or misuse something, which has no link to decoration at all.
Adorn means to add beauty or ornamentation to something, which is exactly the sense in which garnish is used for food or, more broadly, for anything made more attractive with an extra touch.

Step 4: Final Answer:
Once the garner sound trap is set aside, the true synonym for GARNISH is "Adorn", option (3).
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