🏚️ A cooking shed 🍔 A small restaurant

cookshack

6.9

A small roadside stall that sells grilled and smoked food

noun
/ˈkʊkˌʃæk/

Informal

: puesto de comida

We stopped at a cookshack on the highway to try their famous barbecue.

Examples

Locals love the grilled chicken served at the neighborhood cookshack every weekend.
The cookshack by the beach is known for its fresh seafood and relaxed atmosphere.
The local cookshack serves the best barbecue in town.
Have you tried the new cookshack on Main Street?
We stopped at a cookshack on the highway to try their famous barbecue.
Locals love the grilled chicken served at the neighborhood cookshack every weekend.
The cookshack by the beach is known for its fresh seafood and relaxed atmosphere.

Synonyms

grill

vscookshack

64 1.6

A restaurant that serves meat and fish cooked on a grill

is smaller and more informal often a street stall serving grilled or smoked food

greasy spoon

vscookshack

Informal

6 5.1

A small cheap restaurant that serves simple fried or grilled food

is a roadside or neighborhood stall often focused on grilled or smoked food

chophouse

vscookshack

1 7.4

A restaurant that serves steaks and grilled meat

is usually smaller more informal and often a roadside or neighborhood stall

cookshop

vscookshack

Archaic

1 8.3

A small shop that sells hot meals to people

is more informal and commonly a roadside or neighborhood food stall

How Permanent

restaurant

∞ 1.0

cafe

206 1.0

cookshack

Informal

6.9

coffee stall

Indian

1.7

Surface Forms

cookshack singular

cookshacks plural

Morphology

cookshack = cook + shack (semi-transparent) = cook + shack

The compound clearly signals a place related to cooking, but the commercial/restaurant sense requires a cultural extension beyond the literal shelter-for-cooking.

Etymology

Cookshack can also mean a casual roadside or neighborhood place to eat; it comes from cook 'to prepare food' and shack 'a small, simple building', so you can think of it as an informal barbecue or food stall.