T-learning # Idiom
Speak Like a Native

That takes the biscuit !



Click below to listen to the phrase.

Choose the correct definition a, b or c.

a) It’s particularly bad.

Well done ! That’s the right answer.

If you say that something someone has said or done takes the biscuit, you mean that it was very bad, and that it stand as the best (or more likely worst) example of a series of things.

In American English, ’to take the cake’ can have the same meaning or mean that something is especially good or outstanding.

French translation

c’est le bouquet, c’est le pompon, c’est le comble, les bras m’en tombent

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Examples in context

‘Cookie law shambles really takes the biscuit

Website owners still don’t know what they need to do to make sure they don’t contravene new regulations.

So "cookie day" has been and gone and it seems that commercial lawyers are none the wiser as to what, exactly, they should be advising websites to do about getting consent from users to store cookies on their computers.’

guardian.co.uk, 27 May 2011

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’Rare, rude tin takes the biscuit

No one has ever identified the artist who successfully sabotaged a Huntley and Palmers biscuit tin by including scenes of debauchery in the herbaceous border.

Since it was produced in 1980, the container has become a legend among collectors and is now largely known as the Disgruntled Employee Biscuit Tin.’

The Times, 29 Dec. 2012

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Everyday usage

She’s been opening my letters - that really takes the biscuit !

I’ve seen bad behaviours before but this really takes the biscuit.

b) It’s really expensive.

Sorry, wrong answer. Please try again.

c) It tastes really delicious.

Sorry, wrong answer. Please try again.


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