хавчик (khavchik)

What it means

1. 1.

   Grub; something to eat. Purely about fuel — nobody describes a restaurant meal as хавчик.

2. 2.

   The verb хавать means to eat in the same unceremonious way, and figuratively to swallow something you are told: хавает всё подряд, 'he believes any old rubbish'.

Examples with translations

• Хавчик есть какой-нибудь?

  Any food going?

• Взяли хавчика и поехали.

  We grabbed something to eat and set off.

Where it comes from

From camp argot хавать 'to eat', itself probably from Romani. The diminutive -чик softens it into something almost cosy, which is how it survives in student and workplace speech.

Other forms

Romanised as:

khavchik