12-letter words containing a, p, e, s, t
- pasteurising — to expose (a food, as milk, cheese, yogurt, beer, or wine) to an elevated temperature for a period of time sufficient to destroy certain microorganisms, as those that can produce disease or cause spoilage or undesirable fermentation of food, without radically altering taste or quality.
- pastoralness — the quality or state of being pastoral or rural
- pastry cream — a creamy custard, often flavoured, used as a filling for éclairs, flans, etc
- pasture land — grassland used for grazing
- pasture rose — a bristly-stemmed rose, Rosa carolina, of the eastern U.S., having slender, straight thorns and large, solitary, rose-pink flowers.
- pastures new — If someone leaves for greener pastures, or in British English pastures new, they leave their job, their home, or the situation they are in for something they think will be much better.
- patent rolls — (in Britain) the register of patents issued
- patent still — a type of still in which the distillation is continuous
- pathlessness — the state of being pathless
- pathogeneses — the production and development of disease.
- pathogenesis — the production and development of disease.
- pause button — a button on a video or music player which can be pressed to temporarily stop the playing of the recording
- paving stone — slab used to lay a path
- paying guest — lodger
- pearl oyster — any of several marine bivalve mollusks of the family Pteriidae, some of which form pearls of great value, inhabiting waters of eastern Asia and off the coasts of Panama and Baja California.
- pearly gates — the entrance to heaven.
- penalty shot — a free shot at the goal defended only by the goalkeeper, awarded to an offensive player for certain defensive violations.
- penalty spot — a point within the penalty area and 12 yards (about 11 m) from the goal, from which a penalty kick may be taken
- penthesileia — the daughter of Ares and queen of the Amazons, whom she led to the aid of Troy. She was slain by Achilles
- pepper steak — strips of beefsteak sautéed with strips of green pepper and onion, and often flavored with soy sauce.
- percutaneous — administered, removed, or absorbed by way of the skin, as an injection, needle biopsy, or transdermal drug.
- perforations — the holes punched that allow individual stamps, coupons, etc to be easily separated
- pericarditis — inflammation of the pericardium.
- periostracum — the external, chitinlike covering of the shell of certain mollusks that protects the limy portion from acids.
- periphrastic — circumlocutory; roundabout.
- peristomatic — surrounding a leaf's stoma or stomata
- perpetualism — a belief in the permanence of a given thing; the belief that a given thing (e.g. the world, a political system) will last forever
- perpetualist — someone who holds to any form of perpetualism
- perseverator — a person who perseverates
- persian knot — a hand-tied knot, used in rug weaving, in which the ends of yarn looped around a warp thread appear at each of the interstices between adjacent threads and produce a compact and relatively even pile effect.
- perspectival — a technique of depicting volumes and spatial relationships on a flat surface. Compare aerial perspective, linear perspective.
- perspicacity — keenness of mental perception and understanding; discernment; penetration.
- perspiration — a salty, watery fluid secreted by the sweat glands of the skin, especially when very warm as a result of strenuous exertion; sweat.
- perspiratory — of, relating to, or stimulating perspiration.
- pertinacious — holding tenaciously to a purpose, course of action, or opinion; resolute.
- pestilential — producing or tending to produce pestilence.
- pestological — relating to pestology
- pet passport — a document that officially records information related to a specific animal, as part of a scheme that allows animals to travel between member countries without undergoing quarantine
- pet scanning — the action or process of using a PET scanner to obtain an image.
- petaliferous — bearing or having petals.
- petite sirah — a dry red wine produced mainly in California
- petrobrusian — a member of a 12th-century sect in S France that rejected the Mass, infant baptism, prayers for the dead, sacerdotalism, the veneration of the cross, and the building of churches.
- petrodollars — Petrodollars are a unit of money used to calculate how much a country has earned by exporting petroleum or natural gas.
- petrozavodsk — a city in NW Russia, capital of the Karelian Autonomous Republic, on Lake Onega: developed around ironworks established by Peter the Great in 1703; university (1940). Pop: 265 000 (2005 est)
- phagocytoses — phagocytize.
- phonasthenia — difficult or abnormal voice production; vocal weakness.
- photo spread — a picture spread. See under spread (def 33).
- photo-stated — a camera for making facsimile copies of documents, drawings, etc., in the form of paper negatives on which the positions of lines, objects, etc., in the originals are maintained.
- photoelastic — displaying photoelasticity; of or relating to photoelasticity
- photorealism — a style of painting flourishing in the 1970s, especially in the U.S., England, and France, and depicting commonplace scenes or ordinary people, with a meticulously detailed realism, flat images, and barely discernible brushwork that suggests and often is based on or incorporates an actual photograph.