130 Cut the mustard
(PW) succeed, do well enough what needs to be done.
He wasn’t able to cut the mustard so he had to leave the army after only one year.
(free)
can't cut the mustard (British, American & Australian) also can't cut it (British)
if you can't cut the mustard, you cannot deal with problems or difficulties If she can't cut the mustard, we'll have to find someone else to do the job.
(goenglish)
Can't Cut The Mustard ( not good enough to participate ... )
"can't cut the mustard"
When you are not able to perform at the required level, you can't cut the mustard. Example: "Did you hear that Williams got fired?" Reply: "Yes. He couldn't cut the mustard."
It is as if cutting "the mustard" were some test that you had to pass in order to belong. If you can't cut the mustard, you are not allowed to participate. Example: "Bob dropped out of medical school." Reply: "Why?" Answer: "He just couldn't cut the mustard."
If you don't work hard enough, or if you just aren't good enough, you can't cut the mustard. Example: "So, do you think you will be able to cut the mustard?"
(unm) Can't cut the mustard.
Whatever the origins of 'can't cut the mustard', they are about as clear as mustard, the expression 'too old to cut the mustard' is always applied to to men today and conveys the idea of sexual inability. ' Can't cut the mustard', however, means not to be able to handle any job for any reason, not just because of old age. Preceeding the derivation of 'too old to cut the mustard' by about half a century, it derives from the expression 'to be the mustard'. "Mustard" was slang for the " genuine article" or " main attraction" at the time. Perhaps someone cutting up to show that he was 'the mustard', or the greatest, was said 'to cut the mustard' and the phrase was later meant to mean to be able to fill the bill or or do the important or main job. In any case, O. Henry first used the words in this sense in his story "Heart of the West" (1907) when he wrote: " I looked around and found a proposition that exactly cut the mustard". Today, 'can't cut the mustard' is usually 'can't cut it' or 'can't hack it'. A recent variant on 'too old to cut the mustard' is 'if you can't cut the mustard, you can lick the jar'.
QPB Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins By Robert Hendrickson
"cut the mustard" (Phrase origins - alt.usage.english)
This expression meaning "to achieve the required standard" is first recorded in an O. Henry story of 1902: "So I looked around and found a proposition [a woman] that exactly cut the mustard."
It may come from a cowboy expression, "the proper mustard", meaning "the genuine thing", and a resulting use of "mustard" to denote the best of anything. O. Henry in "Cabbages and Kings" (1894) called mustard "the main attraction": "I'm not headlined in the bills, but I'm the mustard in the salad dressing, just the same." Figurative use of "mustard" as a positive superlative dates from 1659 in the phrase "keen as mustard", and use of "cut" to denote rank (as in "a cut above") dates from the 18th century.
Other theories are that it is a corruption of the military phrase "to pass muster" ("muster", from Latin "monstrare"="to show", means "to assemble (troops), as for inspection"); that it refers to the practice of adding vinegar to ground-up mustard seed to "cut" the bitter taste; that it literally means "cut mustard" as an example of a difficult task, mustard being a relatively tough crop that grows close to the ground; and that it literally means "cut mustard" as an example of an easy task (via the negative expression "can't even cut the mustard"), mustard being easier to cut at the table than butter.
The more-or-less synonymous expression "cut it" (as in "'Sorry' doesn't cut it") seems to be more recent and may derive from "cut the mustard".
