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fritter
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
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English
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English fryture, from Middle French friture, from Old French friture, from Vulgar Latin *frīctūra, from Latin frīgō (“to fry”); compare fry.
For the development of Middle English /iu̯r(ə)/ into /ə(ɹ)/, compare armour, batter, border, solder.
Pronunciation
Noun
fritter (plural fritters)
- A dish made by deep-frying food coated in batter.
- A fragment; a shred; a small piece.
- 1662 (indicated as 1663), [Samuel Butler], “[The First Part of Hudibras]”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn and Henry Herringman, […], published 1678; republished in A[lfred] R[ayney] Waller, editor, Hudibras: Written in the Time of the Late Wars, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: University Press, 1905, →OCLC:
- And cut whole giants into fritters.
Derived terms
- apple fritter
- corn fritter
- French fritter
- fritter batter
- fritterlike
- fritterware
- oyster fritter
- rice fritter
- spam fritter
Translations
dish made by deep-frying
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Verb
fritter (third-person singular simple present fritters, present participle frittering, simple past and past participle frittered)
- (intransitive, often with about, around, or away) To squander or waste time, money, or other resources; e.g. occupy oneself idly or without clear purpose, to tinker with an unimportant part of a project, to dally, sometimes as a form of procrastination.
- I was supposed to do work, but I frittered around all afternoon.
- He can’t figure out how to finish the paper he’s writing, so he’s resorted to frittering with the fonts.
- It is quite possible to fritter one's life away in answer to the endless calls of others.
- (transitive) To sinter.
- (transitive) To cut (meat etc.) into small pieces for frying.
- (transitive) To break into small pieces or fragments.
- 1728, [Alexander Pope], “(please specify the page)”, in The Dunciad. An Heroic Poem. […], Dublin; London: […] A. Dodd, →OCLC:
- Break all nerves, and fritter all their sense.
Derived terms
Translations
to waste time
sinter — see sinter
to cut meat into small pieces
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to break into small pieces
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- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
See also
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French
Pronunciation
Verb
fritter
- (transitive) to fritter / sinter
Conjugation
Conjugation of fritter (see also Appendix:French verbs)
Further reading
- “fritter”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
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