Dans le pétrin
Meaning: In serious trouble.
Language: French
Literally: In the kneading trough
Category: Food & Drink
Origin: The pétrin is the baker's trough where dough is worked, and being in it is being handled rather than doing the handling. Stuck in the dough is the sense, not merely near it.
More idioms — Food & Drink
- Avoir du pain sur la planche — To have a great deal of work ahead.
- Manger son pain blanc en premier — To take the easy part at the start and leave the hard part for later.
- C'est du nanan — It is delicious — or, by extension, extremely easy.
- Un pique-nique — A meal eaten outdoors to which everyone contributes.
- Cracher dans la soupe — To disparage the thing that sustains you.
- Trempé comme une soupe — Drenched to the skin.
More French idioms
- Être médusé — To be struck dumb with astonishment.
- Motus et bouche cousue — Not a word to anyone.
- À fleur de peau — Raw and easily provoked, of emotions; or just at the surface.
- Avoir bon pied bon œil — To be in excellent shape, especially for one's age.
- Avoir le pied marin — To keep one's balance on a moving deck; to be unshaken by turbulence.
- Au pied levé — At a moment's notice, with no preparation.
From our tongue twisters
- Seize chaises sèches sur seize arches sèches. — A relentless collision of 'sei', 'sèch', and 's' — the tongue can't find traction.
- Un beau ver vert dans un verre vert verra un ver vert. — Ver (worm), vert (green), and verre (glass) are near-homophones — distinguishing them at…
- Didon dîna, dit-on, du dos d'un dodu dindon dont le dodu dos dodine. — A 'd' / 'din' / 'dod' avalanche that seems designed to jam the tongue in third gear.
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