What it means
Nosh is food, or the act of grabbing something to eat, usually casual and filling rather than fancy. A nosh-up is a proper big, hearty meal. The word comes from Yiddish, so it’s got a bit of history, but it still pops up in everyday chat. Watch out though, nosh off is a separate, rude phrase meaning oral sex.
Usage examples
"Fancy a bit of nosh after work? I’m hanging, so let’s hit that new Thai place and get something proper in us."
"Fancy a bit of nosh after the second half of the West Ham match at the Boleyn Ground on Saturday afternoon, I am proper hanging from the four pints at the Queen's Head before kick-off, so let us hit that new Thai place on the Roman Road and get something genuinely filling and spicy in us before the tube ride home to Stratford."
"My nan in Hackney puts on a proper nosh-up every Boxing Day at the small terraced house on Mare Street with the whole family of seventeen people squeezed around the dining table extended into the hallway, roasts a turkey of nine kilos with all the trimmings of the East End tradition, and the leftover sandwiches on the white sliced bread last until Wednesday at lunch."
Where it comes from
From the Yiddish nashn (to nibble, snack), itself from the German naschen with the same sense, brought to the English language by the Jewish immigrant communities of the East End of London in the late nineteenth century. The word spread from the bagel shops of Brick Lane and the salt-beef bars of Aldgate into general Cockney usage by the nineteen twenties, picked up by the music hall comedians and the Daily Mirror columnists, and now sits as the universal British colloquial verb-and-noun for the casual meal in pub, café and corner-shop counter from London to Glasgow.
Other ways to say it
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