Wiktionary
broad in the beam
a. (context idiomatic English) with fat on the hips and the bottom
Usage examples of "broad in the beam".
She was broad in the beam, and from her low freeboard he guessed her to be fully laden.
Three miles to the north-east he saw the two ships, their sails white against the black islands of Diego Ramirez: three to four hundred tons, bluff-bowed, broad in the beam.
She's not that old green launch with a yellow line, very broad in the beam?
Spray was eighty feet long, with two masts, and broad in the beam, with room for deck cargo as well as in the holds.