What does まかなう mean here?

Question

A few minutes ago Anthony was talking about 思い and 想い on chat, and he asked a question about them. I looked up the verb 思う in 明鏡国語辞典 since I thought it was relevant. It has this bit:

「想う」は、主に心にイメージを描く意で「幼少のころを想う」「想う人はもういない」などと使うが、今は一般に「思う」でまかなう。

I'm not familiar with this use of まかなう. The definitions I'm familiar with are more or less the dictionary definitions: providing meals for someone, paying for their expenses (covering living expenses, medical costs, etc.), or things like that. But that doesn't really make sense to me here.

I think this is saying something like 「思う」 is now used generally while 「想う」 is usually used in the more limited manner the sentence describes. But I don't really get まかなう. I'm having trouble finding a dictionary definition that fits. Is it talking about 「思う」 generally being used in place of 「想う」 ?

What does まかなう mean here?

Answer 1

In that context, 「まかなう」 means "to get by or manage with the bare minimum without asking for more".

Your dictionary is saying that in many cases, only 思う is used nowadays instead of using 想う, which people have tended to prefer in the past.　　

Example: When the eatery staff cook a meal for themselves using only what is left and available in the kitchen without obtaining additional ingredients, those dishes are called まかない[料理]{りょうり}.

EDIT: "to make do" was the English phrase I was trying to remember but failed until now!