English equivalent to "a small fruit in an elephant's mouth"

Question

In the Indian language of Malayalam, there's a saying "Aana vayil ambazhanga", which literally translates to:

A small fruit in an elephant's mouth.

It means:

Having too small an amount for a very large need.

What's an equivalent idiom in English?

"Bring a knife to a gunfight", can mean entering a conflict without preparation. "Too little, too late" can mean something is not in time to be effective. These don't fit here, because I want it to only mean "too small an amount for a very large need" and nothing more.

Answer 1

Try drop in the ocean, defined by Cambridge dictionary as

A very small amount compared to the amount needed.

Answer 2

"A drop in the bucket / ocean" is the idiom for your context. But, there are some short phrases that could be used.

"Practically (or virtually) nothing" means it is too small to satisfy any needs. For example:

A small fruit in an elephant's mouth. That's practically nothing.

You could also consider using "a mere smidgen".

Answer 3

This page seems to be trending toward noun phrases (although "bring a knife to a gunfight" is, obviously, a verb phrase).  Another verb phrase that may fit your need is scratch the surface:

To deal with only a very small part of a subject or a problem:
The amount of aid that has been offered is hardly going to scratch the surface of the problem.
                        — Cambridge English Dictionary

Investigate or treat something superficially, as in
This feed-the-hungry program only scratches the surface of the problem.
                        — Dictionary.com

Answer 4

I think you might consider something like "pissing on a forest fire" or "spitting on a house fire" but these are very regional and informal.

Answer 5

When a somewhat violent connotation is desired:

(like putting) a band-aid on a bullet wound

Haven't found a standard reference for the phrase. It's a fairly recent coinage and seems popular online .

Answer 6

English tends to allow for quite creative metaphors so you could entirely legitimately make up your own version and people would understand what you mean.

To take the example you quote 'a small fruit in an elephant's mouth' is perhaps a little awkward but, with context it would be understood by fluent speakers of English. It could also be improved by being more specific, for example you could say 'your plan is like feeding a grape to a hungry elephant'.

In fact in English there is a whole class of similar metaphors for things which are inadequate, futile, inappropriate or useless which go along the lines of 'A [noun] at/for/in [noun]]'

Similarly English tends to be very open to novelty and metaphors from other languages often find their way into general usage. For example there isn't a generic English word for a 'small fruit' so that is a niche waiting to be filled.

Answer 7

A drop of water for a parched mouth - to convey the desperation