flaky

/fleik/

Thân thiện

The pastry chef sprinkles flaky salt on top of the chocolate tart.

Definition

1. Adjective:
   • Conspicuously or grossly unconventional or unusual: Describes something or someone that is very strange, odd, or bizarre in appearance, behavior, or style.
   • Made of or easily forming flakes: Describes a substance that breaks or separates easily into small, thin pieces or layers.

Usage and Examples

• Describing unconventional behavior or style:

  • His flaky ideas about management were not taken seriously by the board.
  • She wore a flaky, colorful costume to the party that turned everyone's heads.

• Describing a physical property of a substance:

  • The paint on the old door was flaky and peeling.
  • This pastry is delicious but has a very flaky crust.

Advanced Usage and Nuances

• Informal/Colloquial Use (often pejorative): When describing a person, "flaky" can imply being unreliable, eccentric, or scatterbrained.
  • Don't rely on him to organize the meeting; he's a bit flaky and might forget.
• Technical/Descriptive Use: In materials science or cooking, it describes a specific texture.
  • The geologist examined the flaky rock structure.
  • A good croissant should be light and flaky.

Variants and Related Words

• Flake (noun): A small, flat, thin piece of something, often one that has broken off.
  • A flake of snow landed on her nose.
• Flake (verb): To break or come off in flakes. Informally, it means to fail to keep an appointment or obligation (often used with "out").
  • The old plaster is flaking off the wall.
  • He flaked on our dinner plans again.
• Flakiness (noun): The quality or state of being flaky.

Synonyms

• For unconventional: Bizarre, eccentric, outlandish, weird, quirky, offbeat.
• For easily breaking into flakes: Crumbly, scaly, peeling, laminated, friable.

Related Phrases and Phrasal Verbs

• Flake out (phrasal verb, informal): To fall asleep from exhaustion, or to fail to follow through on something.
  • After the long hike, I just flaked out on the couch.
  • She promised to help but flaked out at the last minute.

Idioms and Common Collocations

• Flaky behavior: Unreliable or odd behavior.
• Flaky skin/paint/crust: Skin that is peeling, or a surface that is coming off in flakes.
• Flaky person: An informal and often critical term for someone perceived as unreliable or spacey.

Học thuật

Adjective

1. conspicuously or grossly unconventional or unusual
   • restaurants of bizarre design--one like a hat, another like a rabbit
   • famed for his eccentric spelling
   • a freakish combination of styles
   • his off-the-wall antics
   • the outlandish clothes of teenagers
   • outre and affected stage antics
2. made of or easily forming flakes
3. made of or resembling flakes
   • flaky soap

Từ đồng nghĩa

• flakey