chilled

1. 1
   adjective

   Brought down to a low temperature; made cool or cold.

   Guests were handed chilled glasses of lemonade as they arrived at the garden party.

   Serve the cucumber soup chilled, with a swirl of yogurt on top.

   Similarcold, cool, iced, cooled

   Oppositewarm, hot, heated

   Note

   The literal sense, already in Middle English as chilled or chylled, is simply chill plus -ed. It belongs to food and drink cooled on purpose, like a chilled bottle of Sancerre packed for a June picnic. That deliberate cooling is what separates it from cold, which says only how a thing feels: chilled glasses were put somewhere to get that way.

2. 2
   verb

   Past tense of chill.

   She chilled the dough for an hour before rolling it out.

   We chilled with some old friends at the beach all weekend.

   Note

   The past tense reaches meanings the adjectives do not. In metalworking, to chill a surface is to harden it by sudden cooling, so a chilled metal face was quenched, not merely made cold. Without an object it can mean became cold or became hard, and in slang it stretches past relaxing to spending time with others: they chilled at her place after the game.

3. 3
   adjective

   Relaxed and at ease; not worried or tense.

   He's pretty chilled about the deadline, even though the rest of us are panicking.

   The café has a chilled atmosphere, with soft music and big armchairs.

   Similarrelaxed, calm, mellow, easygoing, unworried

   Oppositetense, stressed, anxious, uptight

   Note

   This is chilled out with the out dropped, and it keeps company with the slang verb for relaxing: anyone who would not say they were chilling will find chilled just as casual. It describes moods and places as well as people, so a café, an evening or a playlist can be chilled. In formal writing, relaxed or calm does the same job.

4. 4
   adjective

   Feeling a cold shiver of fear; filled with an uneasy sense of dread or alarm.

   She was left chilled by the calm way he described the crime.

   The chilled audience sat in silence as the horror film's final scene played out.

   Similarfrightened, horrified, unnerved, disturbed, shaken

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