Meanings
alternative nutty as a fruit cake
- colloquialnot comparablesimileBehaving in an eccentric, foolish, or kooky manner; very nutty.
2003, William Safire / NY Times News Service, "Fruitcake: A word that gets the US Congress to call the cops", Taipei Times, 10 Aug, p. 9, Eugene O'Neill, in his 1914 play, The Movie Man, coined a memorable simile: "We sure are as nutty as a fruitcake or we wouldn't be here."
1 more example
... and assuming that the defendant's Aunt Jane, in Wilkes-Barre, was as nutty as a fruitcake, and his grandfather, in Oskaloosa, had to wear cotton in his ears ...
1912, G. Graham (publisher), The Saturday Evening Post - Volume 185, Part 1, page 10Synonyms: nuttier than squirrel shit, barmy, crazy, daffy, dotty, loopy, mad, wacky
Synonyms & antonyms
adjectiveBehaving in an eccentric, foolish, or kooky manner; very nutty.
Origin
First use appears c. 1911 or 1912. See cite below.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
nutty as a fruitcake. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/nutty%20as%20a%20fruitcake
“nutty as a fruitcake.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/nutty%20as%20a%20fruitcake. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “nutty as a fruitcake,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/nutty%20as%20a%20fruitcake.
Source: nutty as a fruitcake on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.