salt-and-pepper

salt-and-pepper (comparative more salt-and-pepper, superlative most salt-and-pepper)

1. Having a color pattern resembling many small speckles of black and white.

   salt-and-pepper hair

   fabric with a salt-and-pepper pattern

   • 1952, John Steinbeck, East of Eden, New York: Viking, 1986, Part 2, Chapter 18, p. 277,

     In the Chop House he ran into young Will Hamilton, looking pretty prosperous in a salt and pepper business suit.

   • 1962, Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, Chapter 15, pp. 252-253,

     A mild infestation gives trees and shrubbery a mottled or salt-and-pepper appearance; with a heavy mite population, foliage turns yellow and falls.

   • 1979, Bernard Malamud, Dubin’s Lives, New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, Chapter 9, p. 330,

     He observed himself staring through the avocado leaves, a gray-haired old man with thick salt-and-pepper sideburns and jealous eyes.