Just a touch
A smidgen is a very small amount of something.
It's used almost exclusively in informal speech and cooking contexts, where precise measurements give way to intuition: Add just a smidgen of salt.
The word belongs to a family of folksy quantity terms—pinch, dash, tad—that suggest approximation and a light touch rather than exactness.
IDEA.org / Words / a smidgen
Just a touch
A smidgen is a very small amount of something.
It's used almost exclusively in informal speech and cooking contexts, where precise measurements give way to intuition: Add just a smidgen of salt.
The word belongs to a family of folksy quantity terms—pinch, dash, tad—that suggest approximation and a light touch rather than exactness.
Related — a little (To minor extent); modicum (Small, limited quantity); tad (Small amount, informally); small · dab · pinch · jot · iota · bit · drop · mite · scintilla · trace
quantity/amounta smidgen ≠ loads Large quantities; a lot · heaps · tons · oodles · a great deal
Amounts: a lot, a few, a little, some, many
smidgen, smidgeon, smidge
Word data: Linguabase (CC0) · www.idea.org/words/a_smidgen