cake
Americannoun
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cakes
plural
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a sweet, baked, breadlike food, made with or without shortening, and usually containing flour, sugar, baking powder or soda, eggs, and liquid flavoring.
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a flat, thin mass of bread, especially unleavened bread.
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a shaped or molded mass of other food.
a fish cake.
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a shaped or compressed mass.
a cake of soap; a cake of ice.
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Animal Husbandry. a compacted block of soybeans, cottonseeds, or linseeds from which the oil has been pressed, usually used as a feed or feed supplement for cattle.
verb (used with object)
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cakes,
present (3rd person singular)
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caked,
past participle, past
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caking
present participle
verb (used without object)
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cakes,
present (3rd person singular)
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caked,
past participle, past
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caking
present participle
idioms
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take the cake,
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to surpass all others, especially in some undesirable quality; be extraordinary or unusual.
His arrogance takes the cake.
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to win first prize.
-
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a piece of cake, something easily done.
She thought her first solo flight was a piece of cake.
noun
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a baked food, usually in loaf or layer form, typically made from a mixture of flour, sugar, and eggs
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a flat thin mass of bread, esp unleavened bread
-
a shaped mass of dough or other food of similar consistency
a fish cake
-
a mass, slab, or crust of a solidified or compressed substance, as of soap or ice
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to enjoy both of two desirable but incompatible alternatives
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informal to be sold very quickly or in large quantities
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informal something that is easily achieved or obtained
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informal to surpass all others, esp in stupidity, folly, etc
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informal the whole or total of something that is to be shared or divided
the miners are demanding a larger slice of the cake
that is a fair method of sharing the cake
verb
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(tr) to cover with a hard layer; encrust
the hull was caked with salt
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to form or be formed into a hardened mass
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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cakesimple
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cakessimple
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have cakedperfect
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has cakedperfect
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am cakingprogressive
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are cakingprogressive
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is cakingprogressive
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have been cakingperfect progressive
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has been cakingperfect progressive
Past
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cakedsimple
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had cakedperfect
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was cakingprogressive
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were cakingprogressive
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had been cakingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of cake
1200–50; Middle English < Old Norse kaka; akin to Middle English kechel little cake, German Kuchen; see cookie
Explanation
A cake is a baked dessert that's often topped with frosting or decorations. For many people, it's not a proper birthday without a birthday cake. Most cakes are made with flour, fat, a sweetener, and something to make the cake rise — like eggs or baking powder. You might prefer denser, richer cheesecakes or tiny, delicate cupcakes, or even a savory version made of potatoes and vegetables. If someone says, "Well, that takes the cake," they're expressing their surprise at something, and if you say, "That exam was a piece of cake," it as easy as eating a piece of cake.
Vocabulary lists containing cake
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
“If we play our cards well, we can have our cake and eat it too,” Van Nieuwerburgh said.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 30, 2026
Chimney cake, another street-food classic turned visitor must-have, is a hollow caramelized pastry prepared over charcoal.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 29, 2026
But an Oscar would be, as he puts it, “the cherry on top of the cake” — not the cake itself.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 21, 2026
Investigators found that the red date cake and the corn sausage rolls had lead levels of 1052mg/kg and 1340mg/kg respectively, both of which far exceed the national food safety standard limit of 0.5mg/kg.
From BBC ● Oct. 17, 2026
She cut Mal an immense slice of cake.
From "Impossible Creatures" by Katherine Rundell
Eventually, he was getting ghosted for food-preparation jobs, including at a company that sells frozen crab cakes.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 17, 2026
Bouquets of banknotes or cakes decorated with currency are often ordered as gifts for weddings, birthdays, graduations and other celebrations.
From BBC ● Oct. 6, 2026
Alongside pineapple upside down cakes and chocolate chip cookies, customers can buy Phillips’s book about the case, “The Cost of My Faith.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 3, 2026
But it does make mistakes when Vera wants to talk about knitting, often mishearing essential words and offering conversations on "biscuits and cakes" and "music, television, the garden or something else".
From BBC ● Oct. 1, 2026
No telling how long Fredo kept things, and they'd bought cakes that tasted like bricks before.
From "Look Both Ways" by Jason Reynolds
In “Digger,” he returns to serious cinema caked in prosthetics playing an oil baron who causes a global meltdown.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 7, 2026
A photograph showed the second man caked in mud, his hands pressed together in prayer, as rescuers carried him on a stretcher.
From Barron's ● Sep. 4, 2026
A brief exam revealed the eagle was quite underweight and weak, and her feet were caked with mud.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 20, 2026
When discovered by a police officer with a metal detector on a cold November morning last year, the iPad was found caked in mud having been underwater for more than five years.
From BBC ● Mar. 24, 2025
Henry asks, examining a spoon with peanut butter caked on it.
From "Dry" by Neal Shusterman and Jarrod Shusterman
The rain and fish goo caking my shoes has already begun to harden.
From National Geographic ● Jul. 17, 2023
The rain had stopped on Sunday and rescue teams and local volunteers were trying to pump out buildings and sweep away mud caking the streets before it could set hard under the sun.
From Reuters ● May 21, 2023
It’s figurative, embedded in the characters and the storyline, but also literal, with dirt and rot caking everything.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 23, 2023
A man named Gajendra Singh Quiriyal — the village’s grand pradhan, or leader — fell to the ground and convulsed on the fire’s edge, caking himself with ashes and embers.
From New York Times ● Mar. 21, 2023
Mud flats near the banks, caking to dry clay, smelled of death.
From "Pax" by Sara Pennypacker
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
