What does collop mean?
Collop is an uncommon English noun denoting a slice of meat, with bacon being its best-known referent. In chiefly British usage, a collop of bacon is a rasher fried or grilled and served with other foods, especially breakfast dishes. The word can also refer, particularly in Scottish English, to a flat cake or patty made from minced meat. Although dictionaries and literary texts preserve its older, broader sense of a piece of meat, modern speakers are most likely to encounter it in connection with bacon. Collop is therefore both a practical culinary term and a survivor of older English vocabulary. It should not be confused with “collapse,” which concerns a structure, institution, or person falling into a sudden failure. For readers encountering the word outside Britain, the essential distinction is between a simple rasher of bacon and the less common Scottish minced-meat patty.
nounA slice of meat, especially a rasher of bacon. In some Scottish usage, it also means a flat cake or patty of minced meat.
- A slice of meat, especially a rasher of bacon.
- A flat cake or patty of minced meat, especially in Scottish usage.
"She served the eggs with a collop of crisp, grilled bacon."
"For breakfast, he cooked two eggs and a collop of bacon."
"The recipe calls for a Scotch collop made with minced beef."
The usual plural adds -s; a count of bacon slices is expressed with the plural.
"She placed two crisp collops on the warming tray."
The word may sound like a slapstick gag, but its central meaning is entirely culinary: a slice of meat, especially bacon.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Where does collop come from?
The word entered English in the late sixteenth century from an obsolete Dutch form, collop, which is generally traced to German. Its early English meaning was broadly “a piece of meat,” a sense that survives in the modern reference to bacon. The deeper origin of the continental source is not sufficiently secure to describe further without speculation.
How collop is actually used
The word is most familiar in British English and may sound archaic or unfamiliar elsewhere. Its sense for a flat cake of minced meat is particularly associated with Scottish usage.
Easily confused with collop
A collapse is a sudden failure or falling inward, whereas a collop is a slice of meat, especially bacon.