What does “-mentes” mean in Hungarian?

Csomó is a knot or a lump; add -mentes and you get csomómentes, “lump-free,” the state every Hungarian sauce recipe demands. That ending is one of the most useful in the language because it is completely productive: attach it to a noun and you have “X-free.” Once you can see it, Hungarian supermarket shelves start translating themselves.

Cukormentes (sugar-free), gluténmentes, laktózmentes, alkoholmentes, zsírmentes, vámmentes (duty-free). It behaves like an adjective, so it takes case endings: csomómentesre keverjük, “we stir it until it’s lump-free,” where -re marks the result the stirring is aiming at. The root is mentes, “free, exempt,” from ment — “to save, to spare.”