What does “buffet” mean?

Six dead after heavy wind, rains buffet Northeast; half a million lose power.

When you see the word buffet, it's hard not to think  “all-you-can-eat.” Although the noun can refer to food set out for self-service, buffet also means “a blow, especially with the hand,” and as a verb “to strike sharply.”

The two meanings of buffet come from very different sources. Buffet the self-serve meal is drawn from the piece of furniture on which such a meal might be served, a bufet “sideboard” in eighteenth-century French, and is pronounced buh-FAY. The meaning of hitting, however, comes from the Old French word bufe “a blow” or “a puff of wind” and is spoken BUH-fit. If the wind buffets the windows of your house, it can make them rattle in their frames, and if you are buffeted by bad news, you might shake in your shoes too.

Buffet /bəˈfeɪ/ (noun) is a meal where people serve themselves different types of food. For example, someone can ask: “Are you having a sit-down meal or a buffet at the wedding?”. In UK is a restaurant in a station, where food and drinks can be bought and eaten.

Buffet /ˈbʌf.ɪt/ (verb) – Note that the pronunciation is different. We use this verb when, wind, rain, etc, hit something repeatedly and with great force: “The little boat was buffeted mercilessly by the waves”.

Fontes: Cambridge Dictionary clique aqui para ouvir a pronúncia das palavras. E também Vocabulary.com clique aqui para ler mais.