chewing, mastication, chew, manduction - biting and grinding food in your mouth so it becomes soft enough to swallow

consumption, ingestion, intake, uptake - the process of taking food into the body through the mouth (as by eating)

chomp, bite - the act of gripping or chewing off with the teeth and jaws

browse, browsing - the act of feeding by continual nibbling

coprophagia, coprophagy - eating feces; in human a symptom of some kinds of insanity

dining - the act of eating dinner

engorgement - eating ravenously or voraciously to satiation

banqueting, feasting - eating an elaborate meal (often accompanied by entertainment)

geophagia, geophagy, pica - eating earth or clay or chalk; occurs in some primitive tribes or sometimes in cases of nutritional deficiency

grazing, graze - the act of grazing

lunching - the act of eating lunch

repletion, surfeit - eating until excessively full

supping - ingestion of liquid food with a spoon or by drinking

degustation, relishing, savoring, savouring, tasting - taking a small amount into the mouth to test its quality; "cooking was fine but it was the savoring that he enjoyed most"

necrophagia, necrophagy - feeding on corpses or carrion

omophagia - the eating of raw food

scatophagy - the eating of excrement or other filth

lactation, suckling - feeding an infant by giving suck at the breast

supplying, provision, supply - the activity of supplying or providing something

infant feeding - feeding an infant

forced feeding, gavage - feeding that consists of the delivery of a nutrient solution (as through a nasal tube) to someone who cannot or will not eat

intravenous feeding, IV - administration of nutrients through a vein

overfeeding - excessive feeding

spoonfeeding - feeding someone (as a baby) from a spoon

hyperalimentation, total parenteral nutrition, TPN - administration of a nutritionally adequate solution through a catheter into the vena cava; used in cases of long-term coma or severe burns or severe gastrointestinal syndromes