lean

To incline, deviate, or bend, from a vertical position; to be in a position thus inclining or deviating.intransitive

• a leaning column
• She leaned out of the window.

To incline in opinion or desire; to conform in conduct; often with to, toward, etc.copulative

• I’m leaning towards voting Conservative in the next election.
• The Hispanic vote leans Democratic.

To rest or rely, for support, comfort, to use as a hard surface for writing, etc.

• He lean'd not on his fathers but himself.
• The slightest effort made the patient cough. He would stand leaning on a stick and holding a hand to his side, and when the paroxysm had passed it left him shaking.

To hang outwards.

To press against.

• Oppreſs'd with Anguiſh, panting, and o'reſpent, / His fainting Limbs against an Oak he leant.

An inclination away from the vertical.

• The trees had various leans toward gaps in the canopy.

Slim; not fleshy.

• They will now dedicate several hours at the gym every day to be leaner and stronger.

Having little fat.

• lean steak cuts

Having little extra or little to spare; scanty; meagre.

• a lean budget
• a lean harvest

Having a low proportion or concentration of a desired substance or ingredient.

• A lean ore hardly worth mining.
• Running on too lean a fuel-air mixture will cause, among other problems, your internal combustion engine to heat up too much.

Of a character which prevents the compositor from earning the usual wages; opposed to fat.archaic

• lean copy, matter, or type

Efficient, economic, frugal, agile, slimmed-down; pertaining to the modern industrial principles of "lean manufacturing".

• lean management
• lean manufacturing

Meat with no fat on it.uncountable

• Jack Sprat would eat no fat, / His wife would eat no lean.

An organism that is lean in stature.countable

• The intermediates and leans are the predominant morphotypes found at the SE-NHR seamounts […]

To thin out (a fuel-air mixture): to reduce the fuel flow into the mixture so that there is more air or oxygen.

• He leaned the mixture in an effort to cause a backfire through the carburetor, the generally accepted method of breaking the ice loose.
• Even the Pilot's Operating Handbooks (POH) for our training airplanes add to our paranoia with their insistence that we not lean the mixture until we're above 5000 feet density altitude.

A recreational drug composed of codeine-promethazine cough syrup mixed with usually soda and associated with the hip-hop culture of the Southern United States.USslanguncountable

• Eyes real tight 'cause I'm chokin' the creep; vision messed up 'cause I'm drinkin' the lean.
• "What's in the cup, let me see that / Girl, where the rest of that promethazine at?" / She said, "Cool, gotta run out to my Cadillac though / And I'll be like Fat Joe, and bring the lean back"