chew the cud
In real, traceable use. Part of the curated seed collection; community review is coming.
Meaning · English
To meditate or ponder before answering; to be deep in thought; to ruminate.
Where it’s used:
Used
Widespread English
Examples
After chewing the cud for a minute or two, they continue the fight.
(The theory was he was chewing the cud
British National Corpus sentence via the MAGPIE corpus (CC BY 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-30)
Sources & notes
Imported from Wikipedia “English-language idioms” (CC BY-SA 4.0, retrieved 2026-07-29), pending review.
Common questions
What does “chew the cud” mean?
To meditate or ponder before answering; to be deep in thought; to ruminate.
Is “chew the cud” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.