n.
- The usual food and drink of a person or animal.
- A regulated selection of foods, as for medical reasons or cosmetic weight loss.
- Something used, enjoyed, or provided regularly: subsisted on a diet of detective novels during his vacation.
- Of or relating to a food regimen designed to promote weight loss in a person or an animal: the diet industry.
- Having fewer calories.
- Sweetened with a noncaloric sugar substitute.
- Designed to reduce or suppress the appetite: diet pills; diet drugs.
v., -et·ed, -et·ing, -ets. v.intr.
To eat and drink according to a regulated system, especially so as to lose weight or control a medical condition.
v.tr.
To regulate or prescribe food and drink for.
[Middle English diete, from Old French, from Latin diaeta, way of living, diet, from Greek diaita, back-formation from diaitāsthai, to live one's life, middle voice of diaitān, to treat.]
dieter di'et·er n.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
