Cookies

How to spell cookies

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce cookies

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does cookies mean?

1. nounSmall sweet baked treats, typically flat and round.
2. nounSmall data files that a website stores on a user's device to remember preferences or activity.

Cookies in a sentence

• The children baked a tray of chocolate chip cookies for the fair.

• The website asked permission to store cookies before loading the page.

• She packed a few cookies alongside the sandwiches for the picnic.

• Clearing the cookies from his browser logged him out of every account.

Where does cookies come from?

Language of origin: Dutch

This word came into English from the Dutch koekje, which literally means 'little cake', a diminutive of koek 'cake'. Dutch settlers in early America brought both the sweet and the word, and by the early 1700s 'cookie' was already in use in American English for a small flat baked treat. In Britain the same item was traditionally called a biscuit, so 'cookie' arrived later and stayed somewhat informal there. The spelling keeps the doubled 'oo' and the soft '-ie' ending of its Dutch parent rather than following an English pattern, which is the small trap for writers. In the late twentieth century the word gained an entirely new life in computing, where a 'cookie' is a small file a website stores on your device, a playful borrowing of the homely snack name.

How the word is built

• cookie (from Dutch koekje: little cake)
• -s (plural)