小菜一碟 (xiǎo cài-yì dié) — (idiom) a piece of cake; very easy

Definition

An informal, spoken idiom meaning "a piece of cake" — something trivially easy for the speaker. More casual than 轻而易举, which is formal/written.

idiom

a piece of cakevery easy

小菜一碟。
Zuò zhè dào tí duì wǒ lái shuō xiǎo cài-yì dié.
Doing this problem is a piece of cake for me.
，小菜一碟。
Tā xué zhōng wén sān nián le, kàn zhòng wén xīn wén xiǎo cài-yì dié.
He has studied Chinese for three years; reading Chinese news is a piece of cake for him.
，小菜一碟，。
Bié dān xīn, zhè jiàn shì xiǎo cài-yì dié, wǒ shí fēn zhōng jiù néng wán chéng.
Don't worry, this is a piece of cake. I can finish it in ten minutes.

Characters in this word

Two or more meaningful parts placed together so that their meanings combine into a new one.

The shape of 小 comes from three small dots, later elongated into its strokes; the apparent parts 八 and 丨 are a later way of seeing it.

Most characters — around four in five — are built this way: one part hints at the meaning, the other at the pronunciation.

艹采菜

Meaning part形符xíngfú

艹Written in full as艸cǎograss; plant

Sound part声符shēngfú

采

Same sound today

菜 has 艹 (grass/plants) on top and 采 below; the top part shows it is a plant, while 采 gives the sound.

An abstract idea shown by a mark or a diagram rather than by a picture of an object.

一 is drawn as one horizontal stroke, marking the number one.

No reliable origin is recorded for this character.

Appears in