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eat

Pronunciation: /iːt/
Translate eat | into French | into German | into Italian | into Spanish
Definition of eat

verb (past ate /ɛt, eɪt/; past participle eaten /ˈiːt(ə)n/)

[with object]
  • put (food) into the mouth and chew and swallow it:he was eating a hot dog eat up all your peas [no object]:she watched her son as he ate
  • have (a meal):we ate dinner in a noisy cafe
  • [no object] (eat out) have a meal in a restaurant: there were plenty of places to eat out in the city centre
  • [no object] (eat in) have a meal at home.
  • vulgar slang, chiefly US perform fellatio or cunnilingus on (someone).

noun

(eats) informal
  • light food or snacks: these make great party eats

Phrases

eat someone alive

informal
(of insects) bite someone many times:we were eaten alive by mosquitoes
exploit someone’s weakness and completely dominate them: the defence lawyers would eat him alive on a written comment like that

eat crow

see crow1.

eat dirt

see dirt.

eat someone's dust

see dust.

eat one's heart out

suffer from excessive longing for someone or something unattainable: I could have stayed in London eating my heart out for you
[in imperative] informal used to indicate that one thinks someone will feel great jealousy or regret:eat your heart out, those who missed the trip

eat humble pie

see humble.

eat like a bird (or a horse)

informal eat very little (or a lot): Dad had been eating like a bird before we came here

eat someone out of house and home

informal eat a lot of someone else’s food: he would eat them out of house and home if he continued to run through biscuits at his present rate

eat one's words

retract what one has said, especially in a humiliated way:they will eat their words when I win

have someone eating out of one's hand

have someone completely under one’s control: the guys have the crowd eating out of their hand right away with a few jokes

I'll eat my hat

informal used to indicate that one thinks that something is extremely unlikely to happen:if he comes back, I’ll eat my hat

what's eating you (or him or her)?

informal what is worrying or annoying you (or him or her)?: OK, Mr Linley, what’s eating you?

Phrasal Verbs

eat something away (or eat away at)

erode or destroy something gradually:the acid began to eat away at the edge of her tunic figurativethe knowledge of his affair still ate away at her

eat into

another way of saying eat away at.
use up (profits, resources, or time):sales were hard hit by high interest rates eating into disposable income

eat someone up

(usually as adjective eaten up) dominate the thoughts of someone completely:I’m eaten up with guilt

eat something up

use resources or time in very large quantities:an operating system that eats up 200Mb of disk space

Origin:

Old English etan, of Germanic origin; related to Dutch eten and German essen, from an Indo-European root shared by Latin edere and Greek edein

eat in other Oxford dictionaries

Definition of eat in the US English dictionary

Nearby words

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