cake

[keyk]

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noun

a sweet, baked, breadlike food, made with or without shortening, and usually containing flour, sugar, baking powder or soda, eggs, and liquid flavoring.

a flat, thin mass of bread, especially unleavened bread.

pancake; griddlecake.

a shaped or molded mass of other food: a fish cake.

a shaped or compressed mass: a cake of soap; a cake of ice.

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), caked, cak·ing.

to form into a crust or compact mass.

verb (used without object), caked, cak·ing.

to become formed into a crust or compact mass.

Nearby words

Idioms

a piece of cake, Informal. something easily done: She thought her first solo flight was a piece of cake.

take the cake, Informal.

to surpass all others, especially in some undesirable quality; be extraordinary or unusual: His arrogance takes the cake.
to win first prize.

Origin of cake

1200–50; Middle English < Old Norse kaka; akin to Middle English kechel little cake, German Kuchen; see cookie

SYNONYMS FOR cake

8. harden, solidify, dry, congeal.

Related formscak·y, cak·ey, adjectivenon·cak·ing, adjective, nounun·cake, verb (used with object), un·caked, un·cak·ing.

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for cakey

The cakey part of this layer cake is mixed with instant (powdered) espresso, which gives it a nutty, toasted taste.
4 Autumnal Desserts|Michel Richard|November 18, 2010|DAILY BEAST
A porterbottle stood up, stogged to its waist, in the cakey sand dough.
Ulysses|James Joyce

British Dictionary definitions for cakey

cake

noun

a baked food, usually in loaf or layer form, typically made from a mixture of flour, sugar, and eggs

a flat thin mass of bread, esp unleavened bread

a shaped mass of dough or other food of similar consistencya fish cake

a mass, slab, or crust of a solidified or compressed substance, as of soap or ice

have one's cake and eat it to enjoy both of two desirable but incompatible alternatives

go like hot cakes or sell like hot cakes informal to be sold very quickly or in large quantities

piece of cake informal something that is easily achieved or obtained

take the cake informal to surpass all others, esp in stupidity, folly, etc

informal the whole or total of something that is to be shared or dividedthe miners are demanding a larger slice of the cake; that is a fair method of sharing the cake

verb

(tr) to cover with a hard layer; encrustthe hull was caked with salt

to form or be formed into a hardened mass

Derived Formscakey or caky, adjective

Word Origin for cake

C13: from Old Norse kaka; related to Danish kage, German Kuchen

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for cakey

cake

c.1600, from cake (n.). Related: Caked; caking.

cake

early 13c., from Old Norse kaka "cake," from West Germanic *kokon- (cf. Middle Dutch koke, Dutch koek, Old High German huohho, German Kuchen). Not now believed to be related to Latin coquere "to cook," as formerly supposed. Replaced its Old English cognate, coecel.

What man, I trow ye raue, Wolde ye bothe eate your cake and haue your cake? ["The Proverbs & Epigrams of John Heywood," 1562]

Originally (until early 15c.) "a flat, round loaf of bread." Piece of cake "something easy" is from 1936. The let them eat cake story is found in Rousseau's "Confessions," in reference to an incident c.1740, long before Marie Antoinette, though it has been associated with her since c.1870; it apparently was a chestnut in the French royal family that had been told of other princesses and queens before her.

Idioms and Phrases with cakey

cake

see eat one's cake and have it, too; flat as a pancake; icing on the cake; nutty as a fruitcake; piece of cake; sell like hot cakes; slice of the pie (cake); take the cake.