fritter

Plural: fritters

Noun

small quantity of fried batter containing fruit or meat or vegetables
A dish made by deep-frying food coated in batter.
A fragment; a shred; a small piece.

Verb

Verb Forms: frittered, frittering, fritters

To waste time, money, or energy on trivial matters.
spend frivolously and unwisely
- "Fritter away one's inheritance"
To squander or waste time, money, or other resources; e.g. occupy oneself idly or without clear purpose, to tinker with an unimportant part of a project, to dally, sometimes as a form of procrastination.
To sinter.
To cut (meat etc.) into small pieces for frying.
To break into small pieces or fragments.

Examples

Don’t fritter away your turns on low-scoring words when high-value letters are available.
He can’t figure out how to finish the paper he’s writing, so he’s resorted to frittering with the fonts.
I was supposed to do work, but I frittered around all afternoon.
It is quite possible to fritter one's life away in answer to the endless calls of others.

Origin / Etymology

Inherited from Middle English fryture, from Middle French friture, from Old French friture, from Vulgar Latin *frīctūra, from Latin frīgō (“to fry”); compare fry.
For the development of Middle English /iu̯r(ə)/ into /ə(ɹ)/, compare armour, batter, border, solder.

Synonyms

dissipate, fool, fool away, fritter away, frivol away, shoot

Scrabble Score: 10

fritter: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Word
fritter: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
fritter: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary

Words With Friends Score: 10

fritter: valid Words With Friends Word