If you describe a trip or visit by an official or businessman as a junket, you disapprove of it because it is expensive, unnecessary, and often has been paid for with public money.
[informal, disapproval]
He took frequent junkets with friends to exotic locales.
junket in British English
(ˈdʒʌŋkɪt)
noun
1.
an excursion, esp one made for pleasure at public expense by a public official or committee
2.
a sweet dessert made of flavoured milk set to a curd with rennet
3.
a feast or festive occasion
verb
4. (intransitive)
(of a public official, committee, etc) to go on a junket
5.
to have or entertain with a feast or festive gathering
Derived forms
junketer (ˈjunketer) or junketter (ˈjunketter) or junketeer (ˌjunkeˈteer)
noun
junketing (ˈjunketing)
noun
Word origin
C14 (in the sense: rush basket, hence custard served on rushes): from Old French (dialect)jonquette, from jonc rush, from Latin juncus reed
junket in American English
(ˈdʒʌŋkɪt)
noun
1.
milk sweetened, flavored, and thickened into curd with rennet
2.
a feast or picnic
3.
a pleasure trip
4. US
an excursion, as by a public official, paid for out of public funds
verb intransitive
5.
to go on a junket or excursion, esp. one paid for out of public funds
verb transitive
6.
to entertain at a feast
Derived forms
junketeer (ˌjunketˈeer) (ˌdʒʌŋkɪˈtɪr) US
noun or ˈjunketer (ˈdʒʌŋkɪtər)
Word origin
ME joncate < ML *juncata, a sweetmeat, cream cheese < L juncus, a rush (see jonquil): because orig. brought to market in rush baskets
Examples of 'junket' in a sentence
junket
London, sandwiched neatly in the middle of the international junket, reaped the benefits.
Babson, Marian DEATH IN FASHION (2002)
Her face still had the terrible pallor but it was not the alabaster whiteness of her mother's, more the ghastliness of unsuccessful junket.
Robert Wilson THE COMPANY OF STRANGERS (2002)
`I'll give you the usual answer, then," Freeman replied with a smile, his first, Mace saw, on the entire junket.