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Glite Dictionary
🪟 A metal grate 🍔 To cook over fire 🍽️ A restaurant 🕵️ To question hard
to grill

to grill

59 4.9
To question someone firmly to get information
  • verb
  • /ɡrɪl/
  • Informal
translation icon : interrogar
  • So, you want to start grilling me now, or should we wait till after dinner?
  • get grilled
  • executives get grilled
  • reporters grill

And my father, I'm grilling Sam Giancana, I was there.

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Examples

  • We actually see the lead negotiator get grilled by this CNBC anchor and it's it gets intense.

  • Before I came into this room, I was actually grilled by a number of very distinguished professors at Harvard.

  • Now it's your time to grill the professors.

  • Those cops grilled me for hours, but they got nowhere.

    Partners (1982)

  • It's no joke getting grilled by the FBI for five hours.

    Fiction book (2000)

  • Audience members lined up at a microphone to grill presenters.

    Academic text (2010)

  • Firstly, in Congress today, BP chiefs have been grilled by congressmen.

  • Rowan County District Attorney Brandy Cook grilled Call on his testimony Thursday afternoon during cross-examination.

    Blog text (27)

  • Whenever she could corner him, she harassed Reno, prodding him for his thoughts, grilling him over strategy.

    Fiction book (1995)

  • The detectives decided to grill the suspect until they uncovered the truth.

Synonyms

to question
vsto grill
570 1.0

To ask someone questions to get information

is more thorough and aggressive than general asking
to interrogate
vsto grill
  • Formal
142 6.5

To question someone carefully and formally to get information

is more aggressive or persistent than formal legal asking
to examine
vsto grill
  • Formal
53 3.1

To ask someone many questions in a formal way to find out facts

is more about aggression and persistence than formal fact finding
to pump
vsto grill
18 7.4

Ask someone many questions to get information

is more aggressive and confrontational than repeated asking

Antonyms

to defend
691 2.8

To speak up to support a person or idea when others criticize it

Phrasal Verbs

to grill chicken
5 2.1

Cook chicken on a grill over high heat to give brown, smoky marks

to grill burger
1 1.9

Cook a burger patty over hot direct heat on metal bars

to get on someone's grill
  • Slang
9.9

To tell someone angrily that you do not like what they did

How Hard

to cross-examine
  • Formal
28 7.2
to interrogate
  • Formal
142 6.5
to grill
  • Informal
59 4.9
to press
285 3.9
to ask
∞ 1.0

Surface Forms

grill infinitive
grilled past
grilled past participle
grilling present participle
grills third person singular

Etymology

The verb grill meaning 'to question someone harshly' is a strong image from the cooking sense: being 'on the grill' feels like being under hot pressure. A helpful way to remember this is to picture hard questions as heat that tries to make someone give answers.