饥不择食 — Chinese idiom

Meaning

• when hungry, you can't pick what you eat ; beggars can't be choosers
• When matters are urgent, don't spend time choosing alternatives.

Character by character

• 饥jīhungry, starving; hunger, famine
• 不bùno, not, un-; negative prefix
• 择zéto select, to choose
• 食shífood; to eat

Idioms sharing a character

• 啼饥号寒 tí jī háo hán
• 如饥似渴 rú jī sì kě
• 漏脯充饥 lòu fǔ chōng jī
• 画饼充饥 huà bǐng chōng jī
• 饥寒交迫 jī hán jiāo pò
• 饥肠辘辘 jī cháng lù lù
• 一丁不识 yī dīng bù shí
• 一尘不染 yī chén bù rǎn
• 一字不差 yī zì bù chà
• 一字不提 yī zì bù tí

Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.