meat

/mit/

/mit/

Other forms: meats

Use meat to mean any food that comes from the flesh of an animal. Bacon is meat. Cupcakes are not meat.

You can refer to hamburgers, pork chops, and barbecued ribs as meat. It's okay to call chicken and turkey meat too, although formally it's known as poultry, while the flesh of fish is simply called fish. Sometimes the edible part of a nut is also called meat, although it's 100 percent vegetarian. If your grandmother thinks you're too skinny, she may feed you "to put some meat on your bones." In Old English, mete was just "food."

Definitions of meat

1. noun

   the flesh of animals (including fishes and birds and snails) used as food
   types:

   stew meat

   tough meat that needs stewing to be edible

   bird, fowl

   the flesh of a bird or fowl (wild or domestic) used as food

   game

   the flesh of wild animals that is used for food

   dark meat

   the flesh of the legs of fowl used as food

   raw meat

   uncooked meat

   red meat

   meat that is dark in color before cooking (as beef, venison, lamb, mutton)

   organs, variety meat

   edible viscera of a butchered animal

   cut, cut of meat

   a piece of meat that has been cut from an animal carcass

   cold cuts

   sliced assorted cold meats

   beef, boeuf

   meat from an adult domestic bovine

   carbonado

   a piece of meat (or fish) that has been scored and broiled

   halal

   (Islam) meat from animals that have been slaughtered in the prescribed way according to the shariah

   jerk, jerked meat, jerky

   meat (especially beef) cut in strips and dried in the sun

   pemican, pemmican

   lean dried meat pounded fine and mixed with melted fat; used especially by North American Indians

   veal, veau

   meat from a calf

   horseflesh, horsemeat

   the flesh of horses as food

   mouton, mutton

   meat from a mature domestic sheep

   lamb

   the flesh of a young domestic sheep eaten as food

   porc, pork

   meat from a domestic hog or pig

   sausage

   highly seasoned minced meat stuffed in casings

   sausage meat

   any meat that is minced and spiced and cooked as patties or used to fill sausages

   escargot, snail

   edible terrestrial snail usually served in the shell with a sauce of melted butter and garlic

   joint, roast

   a piece of meat roasted or for roasting and of a size for slicing into more than one portion

   confit

   a piece of meat (especially a duck) cooked slowly in its own fat

   poultry

   flesh of chickens or turkeys or ducks or geese raised for food

   wildfowl

   flesh of any of a number of wild game birds suitable for food

   giblet, giblets

   edible viscera of a fowl

   gobbet

   a lump or chunk of raw meat

   offal

   viscera and trimmings of a butchered animal often considered inedible by humans

   heart

   a firm rather dry variety meat (usually beef or veal)

   liver

   liver of an animal used as meat

   sweetbread, sweetbreads

   edible glands of an animal

   brain

   the brain of certain animals used as meat

   stomach sweetbread

   edible pancreas of an animal

   neck sweetbread, throat sweetbread

   edible thymus gland of an animal

   tongue

   the tongue of certain animals used as meat

   venison

   meat from a deer used as food

   chop

   a small cut of meat including part of a rib

   chine

   cut of meat or fish including at least part of the backbone

   leg

   the limb of an animal used for food

   side, side of meat

   a lengthwise dressed half of an animal's carcass used for food

   forequarter

   the front half of a side of meat

   hindquarter

   the back half of a side of meat

   cut of beef

   cut of meat from beef cattle

   rib

   cut of meat including one or more ribs

   entrecote

   cut of meat taken from between the ribs

   shank

   a cut of meat (beef or veal or mutton or lamb) from the upper part of the leg

   shin, shin bone

   a cut of meat from the lower part of the leg

   brisket

   a cut of meat from the breast or lower chest especially of beef

   steak

   a slice of meat cut from the fleshy part of an animal or large fish

   loin

   a cut of meat taken from the side and back of an animal between the ribs and the rump

   sirloin

   the portion of the loin (especially of beef) just in front of the rump

   tenderloin, undercut

   the tender meat of the loin muscle on each side of the vertebral column

   neck

   a cut of meat from the neck of an animal

   shoulder

   a cut of meat including the upper joint of the foreleg

   tripe

   lining of the stomach of a ruminant (especially a bovine) used as food

   buffalo

   meat from an American bison

   ground beef, hamburger

   beef that has been ground

   bully beef, corn beef, corned beef

   beef cured or pickled in brine

   pastrami

   highly seasoned cut of smoked beef

   beef jerky

   strips of dried beef

   biltong

   meat that is salted and cut into strips and dried in the sun

   cut of veal

   cut of meat from a calf

   calves' feet

   feet of calves used as food; usually jellied

   hare, rabbit

   flesh of any of various rabbits or hares (wild or domesticated) eaten as food

   cut of mutton

   cut of meat from a mature sheep

   cut of lamb

   cut of meat from a lamb

   saddle

   cut of meat (especially mutton or lamb) consisting of part of the backbone and both loins

   rack

   rib section of a forequarter of veal or pork or especially lamb or mutton

   cut of pork

   cut of meat from a hog or pig

   cochon de lait, suckling pig

   whole young pig suitable for roasting

   salt pork

   fat from the back and sides and belly of a hog carcass cured with salt

   pigs' feet, pigs' knuckles

   feet or knuckles of hogs used as food; pickled or stewed or jellied

   chitlings, chitlins, chitterlings

   small intestines of hogs prepared as food

   haslet

   heart and liver and other edible viscera especially of hogs; usually chopped and formed into a loaf and braised

   black pudding, blood pudding, blood sausage

   a black sausage containing pig's blood and other ingredients

   Bologna sausage, bologna

   a large smooth-textured smoked sausage of beef and veal and pork

   chipolata

   a small thin sausage

   chorizo

   a spicy Spanish pork sausage

   dog, frank, frankfurter, hot dog, hotdog, weenie, wiener, wienerwurst

   a smooth-textured sausage of minced beef or pork usually smoked; often served on a bread roll

   headcheese

   sausage or jellied loaf made of chopped parts of the head meat and sometimes feet and tongue of a calf or pig

   knackwurst, knockwurst

   short thick highly seasoned sausage

   liver pudding, liver sausage, liverwurst

   sausage containing ground liver

   pepperoni

   a pork and beef sausage (or a thin slice of this sausage)

   pork sausage

   sausage containing pork

   salami

   highly seasoned fatty sausage of pork and beef usually dried

   souse

   pork trimmings chopped and pickled and jelled

   lunch meat, luncheon meat

   any of various sausages or molded loaf meats sliced and served cold

   type of:

   food, solid food

   any solid substance (as opposed to liquid) that is used as a source of nourishment
2. noun

   the inner and usually edible part of a seed or grain or nut or fruit stone
   synonyms: kernel

   type of:

   plant part, plant structure

   any part of a plant or fungus
3. noun

   the choicest or most essential or most vital part of some idea or experience
   synonyms: center, centre, core, essence, gist, heart, heart and soul, inwardness, kernel, marrow, nitty-gritty, nub, pith, substance, sum

   types:

   bare bones

   (plural) the most basic facts or elements

   hypostasis

   (metaphysics) essential nature or underlying reality

   haecceity, quiddity

   the essence that makes something the kind of thing it is and makes it different from any other

   distillation, quintessence

   the purest and most concentrated essence of something

   stuff

   a critically important or characteristic component

   type of:

   cognitive content, content, mental object

   the sum or range of what has been perceived, discovered, or learned