iomete

Iom plus the diminutive -et- plus the adverbial -e: some, made smaller, and turned into an adverb. It softens whatever follows it, which makes it the polite hedge of spoken Esperanto, the equivalent of British "a bit". Note the split in what follows: iomete on its own modifies an adjective or verb, but if you want a little bit of a substance you need da, as in iomete da akvo. The same -et- gives you varmeta for lukewarm and rideti for smile, so the pattern is worth the five seconds it takes to learn.