to spoil
- verb
- /spɔɪl/
- In a tropical climate, cacao pods spoil quickly, rendering their transport on long trips by foot or canoe unlikely.
They can stay on the shelf longer before they spoil.
- They can stay on the shelf longer before they spoil.
- In Texas and Louisiana and some of these places where they stored oil and so on, because oil will spoil, right?
- It's basically rice that's left out of room temperature to spoil for three or four days and a specific kind of yeast or fungus grows on it.
- Homer talks about it long, long before our modern era, if it was a thing that was done routinely, you had to cure the meat or it would spoil.
Examples
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Foods will also last longer before spoiling, allowing food to be distributed more easily.
Academic text (2012) -
The Southern Fleet suffered delays, a general fell ill, and food spoiled in the warm weather of South China.
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Well, if it were gonna spoil, we opened it the night before.
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We are running behind, and my breakfast will spoil.
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I don't want anything to spoil that day.
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- Don't spoil your dinner.
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- Now I shouldn't keep this open for too long or it will spoil.
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Let's save the cake for later so we don't spoil our dinner.
Fiction book (1993) -
Don't have any more, because it's gonna spoil your appetite.
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If you leave the milk out of the fridge, it will spoil quickly.
Synonyms
To slowly fall into ruin because of age or neglect
Become unsafe to eat or use because it has spoiled
To become spoiled and no longer safe to eat or use
To slowly become weaker or fall apart because it is not cared for
Antonyms
Idioms
- Informal
To give someone too much kindness and gifts so they expect special treatment
Phrasal Verbs
Compounds
How Spoiled
Surface Forms
Etymology
Spoil (of food: to go bad) grew from the same root spoliare and the idea of being ruined or made useless. So when food spoils it has been 'ruined' and is no longer good to eat.