different between dollop vs dallop

English

From earlier East Anglian dialectal dallop (“patch, tuft (of grass, etc.)”), of unknown origin. Compare dialectal Norwegian dolp (“lump”).

dollop (plural dollops)

A considerable lump, scoop, or quantity of something, especially soft food. [from 1810s]
- 1907, Ian Hay [pseudonym; John Hay Beith], “The Philanthropists”, in “Pip”: A Romance of Youth, Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood & Sons, ?OCLC; republished Boston, Mass.; New York, N.Y.: Houghton Mifflin Company; The Riverside Press Cambridge [Mass.], 1917, ?OCLC, page 23:
  On lifting it up he was surprised by an unwonted feeling of stickiness; but when he held the instrument to the light, the reason revealed itself to him immediately in the form of a dollop of congealed chicken-broth, nicely rounded to the shape of the cup, which shot from its resting-place, with a clammy thud, on to his clean shirt-front, and then proceeded to slide rapidly down inside his dress waistcoat, leaving a snail-like track, dotted with grains of rice, behind it.

dollop (third-person singular simple present dollops, present participle dolloping, simple past and past participle dolloped)

(transitive) To apply haphazardly in generous lumps or scoops. [from 1820s]
- 1996, Buck Ramsey, “Christmas Waltz”, in Christmas Waltz (Peregrine Smith book), Salt Lake City, Utah: Gibbs Smith, ?ISBN; reprinted in “Remembrances of a Season: Sentiments on Waltzin’, Strollin’, Whittlin’, Roastin’, and Toastin’”, in Jesse Mullins, editor, American Cowboy, Sheridan, Wyo.: American Cowboy L.L.C., November–December 1996, ISSN 1079-3690, page 82:
  They cobbler the plums they put up back in summer, / They bake a wild turkey and roast backstrap deer, / They dollop the sourdough for rising and baking, / And pass each to each now the brown jug of cheer.
(transitive, intransitive) To dole out in a considerable quantity; to drip in a viscous form.
- 2008, Rachel Johnson, Shire Hell, London: Penguin Books, ?ISBN; republished as In a Good Place, Touchstone trade paperback edition, New York, N.Y.: Simon & Schuster, June 2009, ?ISBN, page 99:
  "It's fah-bu-lous to have these early salads, from the greenhouse, but don't they make you just long for summer?" Cath says to no one in particular as she dollops away generously onto plates.

Origin unknown. Perhaps cognate with Norwegian dialect dolp, a lump.

dallop (plural dallops)

(obsolete, East Anglia and Essex) A tuft or clump, especially an unploughed patch amongst fields of corn.
(obsolete) Alternative form of dollop. [15th–18th c.]

Wright, Joseph (1900) The English Dialect Dictionary?^[2], volume 2, Oxford: Oxford University Press, page 116, "dollop", sense 4.

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