noodle
Pluralnoodles
Verbnoodles, noodling, noodled
Pluralnoodles
Formsnoodles, noodling, noodled
- 1A string or flat strip of pasta or other dough, usually boiled, then served in soup or mixed with a sauce and other ingredients.
She slurped the noodles straight from the steaming broth.
He twirled a single noodle around his fork before tasting the sauce.
Note
The food sense comes into English from Dutch noedel or its source, German Nudel. That word probably began as a variant of Knödel, 'dumpling', which explains the archaic dumpling meaning. In everyday use the word is mostly plural: you cook noodles, eat noodles, order the noodles. The singular tends to appear when one strand is singled out, as when a long noodle is slurped up out of a soup.
- 2A person's brain or head.
She tapped her noodle and said the answer would come to her.
A quick thinker like him never has trouble using his noodle.
Similarhead, brain, noggin, bean
Note
Here the possible link with noddle, 'the head', is easiest to see; the origin story sits with the 'fool' meaning. The word turns up mostly in remarks about thinking: use your noodle, nothing wrong with your noodle. That keeps it light and jokey, a way to talk about someone's intelligence without sounding clinical.
- 3Short for pool noodle.
He clung to a bright orange noodle while learning to swim.
The pool deck was littered with noodles after the birthday party.
Note
A shortening that works only where the setting supplies the missing word. At the poolside, noodle alone means the buoyant foam tube; elsewhere the full pool noodle avoids confusion with the food. It is informal and takes the ordinary plural, noodles. It covers both the toy children float on and the exercise tool used in water workouts.
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- 5To ponder or think about a particular matter or question.
I'll noodle the proposal over the weekend and get back to you.
The team noodled several options before settling on a name.
Similarponder, mull, consider, weigh, contemplate
Note
American informal speech carries the music word's loose, exploratory feel into thinking. To noodle an idea is to turn it over the way mull over does. It takes a direct object, often with a particle: noodle a thought around, noodle a proposal over. By contrast, the intransitive 'muse' sense needs no object, as in noodling over a problem.
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- 7To play an instrument or sing in an improvisatory, lighthearted way, often adding ornamental runs of notes.
Before the set, the saxophonist would noodle quietly in the corner.
The keyboardist noodled around a blues scale between songs.
Note
Without an object, the verb names the activity itself: a player noodles, or noodles around, warming up or wandering through ideas. W. H. Auden's 'Thanksgiving for a Habitat' (1965) hears birds 'softly noodling' before sunrise. The tone can tip either way. It is affectionate for limbering up, and critical when someone noodles with a trumpet all afternoon and it all sounds awful.
- 8To play an instrument or passage, or sing a passage, in an improvisatory, lighthearted way.
The guitarist noodled a lazy melody over the band's groove.
He'll noodle any tune you hum, adding little flourishes of his own.
Note
The jazz musician's verb, of uncertain origin. It may descend from the Shetland humming sense, or from German nudeln, 'to make music or sing listlessly'. In this transitive use the music is the object: you noodle a melody, a passage, or the instrument itself. It also covers ornament, so a player can noodle a run of decorative notes as well as a whole tune.
- 9An improvised passage of music played on an instrument, or a run of ornamental notes; a trill.
The recording opens with a bright guitar noodle before the drums enter.
Critics praised the pianist's delicate noodles between verses.
Similarriff, lick, run, flourish
Note
A noun made from the playing itself. One noodle is a single improvised run or ornamental flourish, and noodles are several of them. Trill is the name for one particular ornament. Noodle stays looser and more informal, covering any passage that sounds spontaneous rather than composed.
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- 11A humorous slang word for the penis.
After a few drinks he made a crude joke about his noodle that nobody found funny.
She rolled her eyes when her brother kept bragging about his noodle in the changing room.
Similarwilly
Note
Slang that trades on the food word's long, thin shape. Its tone is jokey rather than clinical, which makes it easy to misjudge. Among friends it can pass as playful. In mixed or formal company it is still a reference to genitals, and an innocent mention of noodles can be heard as a double meaning.
- 12To attempt something in an informal or uncertain way; to fiddle.
She noodled at the recipe, adjusting things until it tasted right.
I'll noodle with the engine before calling a mechanic.
Similarfiddle, tinker, experiment, play
Note
Tinkering is the idea, and with is the preposition: you noodle with the knobs, the settings, an engine. The word suggests trial and error rather than real know-how. That is why it pairs naturally with doubt: noodling with the knobs will not fix a machine that is truly broken.
- 13A foolish person; someone who shows poor judgment.
His brother is a complete noodle when it comes to money.
"What are you two noodleth laughing at?" Norrie went on, with a touch of indignation. "Ithn't the thenthe of thent in hith nothe?"
1905, Alfred Colbeck, “Netted: The Story of a Capture”Similarfool, nitwit, dimwit, idiot
Note
A different word from the pasta noun, of uncertain origin and possibly a variant of noddle, 'the head'. It was a lively insult in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Walter Scott's Woodstock (1826) mocks 'the noodles of Hogs-Norton'. Sydney Smith, in 1839, sets 'the chuckling grin of noodles' beside the leer of the political rogue. Today the word is dated.
- 14To behave in a silly or frivolous way; to fool around or waste time.
Don't noodle about when there's work to be done.
The apprentices noodled in the workshop until the foreman returned.
Similardawdle, dally, idle, loaf
Note
A British dialect use, intransitive, as in noodle about. It stays close to the 'fool' noun: to noodle here is to act the noodle. Its American look-alike, noodling around, looks the same but comes from a separate verb tied to idle music-making. The British sense is the one with the fool in its family tree.
- 15A long, slender dragon, usually of the eastern type.
A golden noodle wound across the temple mural.
The festival float carried an enormous noodle with flowing whiskers.
Note
A furry-fandom coinage drawn from the creature's build: the long, serpentine dragon of eastern tradition looks rather like a strand of pasta. Inside that community it is ordinary slang. Outside it, most readers will reach first for the food sense, so writing for a general audience may need eastern dragon alongside it on first mention.
- 16To deceive or trick someone.
The peddler noodled the villagers out of their last coins.
Con men would noodle the unwary at every country market.
Similardupe
Note
The verb grew out of the noun for a fool: to noodle someone was to make a noodle of them, much as dupe serves as both noun and verb. It is obsolete, so it belongs to historical reading rather than modern speech. A present-day listener would more likely hear the casual, time-wasting verbs.
- 17To catch fish (usually large catfish) turtles, or other water animals with the bare hands, or with a gaff or fishing spear.
Every summer they noodle catfish in the muddy river shallows.
He noodled a thirty-pound catfish from beneath the submerged roots.
Similarguddle
Note
A separate word again, of unknown origin, perhaps related to guddle, the word for catching fish by hand. Guddle also serves as a synonym, alongside catfist. The hands are the point, and they pay for it: noodling flathead in a river can leave them badly cut. Very large catfish are the usual quarry, and the word stretches to cover taking fish with a gaff or spear.
- 18To croon or hum a melody in a low voice, either deep in pitch or soft in volume.
She noodled a lullaby while rocking the baby to sleep.
I noodle old songs under my breath while I cook.
Note
A Shetland word with Scandinavian roots. It is possibly a blend of Shetland Scots nune, 'to croon or hum', which comes from Danish and Norwegian humming words, with doodle, once used of playing the bagpipes. It can take an object or stand alone: you noodle a tune, or simply noodle. Either way the singing is under the breath, not a performance.
- 19To search through mullock (the waste from mining or ore processing) for opals.
They noodle the mullock for hours, hoping to spot a flash of color.
He noodled the leftover mullock until dark and found one good stone.
Note
Australian opal-field slang of uncertain origin. It may come from the obsolete 'trick' verb, or from nodule, a rounded lump. In this transitive use the waste is the object: you noodle the mullock, the heaps left over from mining or ore processing, looking for stones still hidden in it.
- 20To hunt through mullock for opals; to fossick.
On weekends they noodle around the abandoned diggings.
He spent his vacation noodling near the old mine tailings.
Similarfossick, prospect, scavenge
Note
The intransitive use is the one visitors meet: you go noodling, or noodle for opal. Ron Moon's Outback Australia (1994) notes that in Coober Pedy noodling is generally discouraged, though a few tourist spots keep noodle pits open to the public. Fossick is the broader word for searching like this; noodle narrows it to opals in mining waste.
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- 22To clear away unwanted material from an opal.
The cutter noodled the opal until its color shone through.
Skilled hands can noodle an opal without cracking it.
Similarclean
- 23A dumpling of the knaidel or knödel kind, cooked in boiling liquid and served in soup.
She ladled broth over a single plump noodle in each bowl.
Light noodles bobbed in the steaming pot of soup.
Note
In older writing, a noodle in the soup may be a boiled dumpling rather than a strand of pasta. The sense is archaic, so for the dumpling itself knaidel or knödel is the clear choice today. The word's likely descent from German Knödel, 'dumpling', explains why it once covered both; that story belongs with the pasta sense.
Showing meanings only.
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Origins
Borrowed from Dutch noedel or its source German Nudel ("piece of pasta, noodle"), the further history is uncertain. It is probably a variant of Knödel ("dumpling"), from Middle High German knödel, either from a root meaning "knot" plus a diminutive suffix, or from a Ladin word for a small dough dumpling, probably going back to Latin minūtus ("diminished").
The origin of the noun is uncertain; it is possibly a variant of noddle ("the head"), and the verb is derived from the noun.
The origin is uncertain. It is possibly a blend of Shetland Scots nune ("to sing softly, hum") and English doodle ("to play the bagpipes"), or from Norn, from Old Norse *grynta, ultimately from Proto-Germanic *grunnatjaną ("to grunt") and thus a doublet of grunt.
The origin of the verb is uncertain; it possibly derives from noodle ("to hum or sing softly," see etymology 3), or from German nudeln ("to make music or sing listlessly"), apparently from Nudel plus a verb suffix. It was probably also influenced by doodle. The noun probably comes from the verb, though the verb is attested later.
Uncertain; it possibly comes from noodle ("to fool or trick someone," now obsolete, see etymology 2), or from nodule ("rounded mass or irregular shape").
Of unknown origin; perhaps related to guddle ("to catch fish with the hands").