cupful
Americannoun
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cupfuls
plural
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the amount a cup can hold.
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Cooking. a volumetric measure equal to 8 fluid ounces (237 milliliters); half pint.
Spelling
See -ful.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of cupful
First recorded in 1350–1400, cupful is from the Middle English word cuppefulle. See cup, -ful
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:
On a recent afternoon, Gérald poured less than a cupful of cooking oil into an old water bottle and handed it to a young boy.
From Seattle Times ● Mar. 8, 2024
Cope asks Truelove if he wants coffee and fetches a small paper cupful before asking about his living situation.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 23, 2023
"A simple-minded but perfect way to master the movement is to practice outdoors with half a cupful of dried beans."
From Salon ● Apr. 12, 2022
When the casing shrinks in the heat of the oven, it pulls up the sides of each slice, forming a little meat cupful of spicy oil.
From New York Times ● Feb. 19, 2019
In the middle of the day we were served a cupful of the unfermented grainbrew, orsh; before sunset we were taken back to the barracks and given dinner, porridge with some vegetables, and beer.
From "The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula K. Le Guin
We sloshed cupfuls from a field across from the school, brought it back to our little tables and carefully used a dropper to transfer the pond water to a microscope slide.
From New York Times ● Nov. 12, 2020
Because, he explains, "with all our knowledge of chemistry we could not produce a meal from a few cupfuls of chalk and salt."
From Scientific American ● Sep. 16, 2019
The key is to think of herbs — particularly the tender ones — not as accents used in mere tablespoons but rather as star players tossed in by fistfuls and cupfuls.
From Washington Post ● Jul. 5, 2019
People waited patiently for nearly two hours for a shot at the chili bowls and the fried chicken sandwiches, the flat bean-filled tacos called "foldies" and the cupfuls of stewed collard greens.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 23, 2016
Shukumar had been going through their supplies steadily, preparing meals for the two of them, measuring out cupfuls of rice, defrosting bags of meat day after day.
From "Interpreter of Maladies" by Jhumpa Lahiri
Definitions 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.
