Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A small, cup-shaped quick bread, often sweetened.
  • noun An English muffin.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A light round spongy cake, the English variety of which is usually eaten toasted and buttered.
  • noun A small earthen plate.
  • noun One who is given to muffing or acting clumsily in playing a game, but more particularly one who in cricket or base-ball fails to retain hold on a ball which comes into his hands. See muff, n., 3.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A light, spongy, cylindrical cake, used for breakfast and tea.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun UK a type of flattish bun, usually cut in two horizontally, toasted and spread with butter, etc, before being eaten
  • noun especially US A type of rich individual cake containing chocolate chips, blueberries or some other flavouring.
  • noun computing a mechanism used in the Java Network Launching Protocol analogous to the cookie mechanism and which permits a program running in a browser to perform operations on a client machine
  • noun slang a term of endearment
  • noun sexual slang a vulva
  • noun baseball, slang a less talented player
  • noun slang a charming, attractive young man

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a sweet quick bread baked in a cup-shaped pan

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Possibly from Low German Muffen, pl. of Muffe, small cake, from Middle Low German.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

The origin is unknown.

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Examples

  • The main difference between a cupcake and a muffin is a light, open crumb, Flo Braker, expert baker and author of the new and long-awaited Baking for All Occasions, told me.

    Not So Guilty Pleasure 2009

  • The combination worked just as well as in the original bar, although, of course, the muffin is a bit less chocolatey than the bar of chocolate itself.

    Blueberry Milk Chocolate Muffins | Baking Bites 2009

  • The main difference between a cupcake and a muffin is a light, open crumb, Flo Braker, expert baker and author of the new and long-awaited Baking for All Occasions, told me.

    Not So Guilty Pleasure 2009

  • The combination worked just as well as in the original bar, although, of course, the muffin is a bit less chocolatey than the bar of chocolate itself.

    Baking Bites » Print » Blueberry Milk Chocolate Muffins 2009

  • I loved the Season 7 Curb Your Enthusiasm episode entitled “The Bare Midriff,” in which a woman named Maureen goes around the office in a tiny shirt that reveals her whole stomach—and what they call a muffin top.

    Gunn’s Golden Rules Tim Gunn 2010

  • I loved the Season 7 Curb Your Enthusiasm episode entitled “The Bare Midriff,” in which a woman named Maureen goes around the office in a tiny shirt that reveals her whole stomach—and what they call a muffin top.

    Gunn’s Golden Rules Tim Gunn 2010

  • I loved the Season 7 Curb Your Enthusiasm episode entitled “The Bare Midriff,” in which a woman named Maureen goes around the office in a tiny shirt that reveals her whole stomach—and what they call a muffin top.

    Gunn’s Golden Rules Tim Gunn 2010

  • SqPixels of Experiments wants to see what you call a muffin and has therefore started a new event called Muffin Monday.

    Muffin Mania Brilynn 2007

  • SqPixels of Experiments wants to see what you call a muffin and has therefore started a new event called Muffin Monday.

    Archive 2007-02-01 Brilynn 2007

  • Martha Paschal is a youthful-looking 50-year-old financial consultant with what she calls a "muffin top" - extra rolls of waistline flab.

    News 2011

Comments

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  • Muffin, the first of the name in our household (see Muffin II for his successor), was with us for only a few years. I was seven when we adopted him as a kitten, and he died after sustaining injuries in a road accident (my grandmother suspected the culprit was a motorcyclist) when he was only three. My memories of Muffin are vague, but I know I loved him and was deeply distressed by his passing. He inadvertantly challenged my young belief in the Judeo-Christian god, as taught by my Presbyterian Sunday School, but that is another story.

    March 12, 2009

  • When I am in trouble, eating is the only thing that consoles me. Indeed, when I am in really great trouble, as anyone who know me intimately will tell you, I refuse everything except food and drink. At the present moment I am eating muffins because I am unhappy.Besides, I am rather fond of muffins.

    -Oscar Wilde The Importance of Being Earnest

    July 29, 2009