Talk about food and things you can't count
I can say what I eat and what I like, and ask if there is something in the house.
Declared core time. Two of the core blocks carry no figure at all, so the real lesson is longer than this sum.
Grammar
4 minEnglish divides nouns into two kinds, and everything else depends on this.
| countable | uncountable | |
|---|---|---|
| examples | apple, egg, sandwich | bread, water, milk, meat, rice |
| singular | an apple | — |
| plural | two apples | — |
| article | a / an | none |
I like bread — no article and no -s. We don't count bread as single things; we count it in pieces: a piece of bread, a glass of water, a cup of tea.
some and any — "an amount of", when the exact amount is not important:
| statement | There is some milk in my fridge. |
| question | Is there any juice? |
| negative | There isn't any juice. |
Common learner errors
written for your languageAn article with an uncountable noun
✗ a bread
✗ a water
✓ bread
water, a piece of bread, a glass of water. In Portuguese, Spanish and German the word for bread is often countable: um pão, un pan, ein Brot mean one roll or one loaf. In English bread is like a substance, so it takes no a.
A plural of an uncountable noun
✗ I like breads
✗ I drink waters
✓ I like bread
I drink water. In Portuguese, Spanish and German the word for bread has a plural (pães, panes, Brote), so learners add -s in English too. In English an uncountable noun never has -s.
some in a question
✗ Is there some juice?
✓ Is there any juice?
French and Italian use the same word in a statement and in a question (Il y a du jus. — Il y a du jus ?), so learners keep some. An exception worth learning straight away: when you offer something, you say some — Would you like some tea?
Pronunciation
3 min/æ/ and /ʌ/ — two different sounds, and food words are full of both.
| /æ/ mouth wide open, lips spread | /ʌ/ mouth half open, a short sound |
|---|---|
| apple, sandwich, ham | butter, cup, lunch |
Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Japanese, Greek and many other languages have only one /a/ sound between them, so learners hear the two as one. Test: cap and cup are different words.
Text
3 minI like bread and cheese. I don't eat meat. There is some milk in my fridge, but there isn't any juice. In the morning I have a sandwich and a cup of tea. My sister doesn't drink coffee. She drinks water.
Exercises
8–10 min1. Sort into two groups:
countable / uncountable. apple, bread, egg, water, sandwich, rice, milk, cake
Show the answers
2. Gap fill.
- There is bread on the table
- Is there milk in the fridge?
- There isn't juice
Show the answers
3. Error correction.
- I eat a bread every day.
- Is there some tea?
- I like breads.
Show the answers
4. Matching.
- a piece of
- a glass of
- a cup of
Show the answers
Summary
Covered
- countable and uncountable nouns
- no article before uncountable nouns
- measures (a cup of)
- some and any
Next — lesson 16: order in a café.
End of the core
The lesson counts as done once the exercises are done. Everything after this is optional.
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Vocabulary for your deck
15 words- bread /bred/ a food made from flour and baked; you make sandwiches with it
- milk /mɪlk/ the white drink that comes from cows
- water /ˈwɔːtə/ the clear drink that comes from the tap or falls as rain
- juice /dʒuːs/ a drink made from fruit, for example oranges or apples
- meat /miːt/ food from an animal, for example a cow or a chicken
- fish /fɪʃ/ an animal that lives in water; its meat as food
- cheese /tʃiːz/ a yellow or white food made from milk
- rice /raɪs/ small white or brown grains that you cook and eat
- apple /ˈæpl/ a round red or green fruit
- egg /eɡ/ a round thing from a chicken that you cook and eat
- sugar /ˈʃʊɡə/ a sweet white food that you put in tea or coffee
- butter /ˈbʌtə/ a yellow food made from milk that you put on bread
- fridge /frɪdʒ/ a cold box in the kitchen where you keep food
- eat /iːt/ put food in your mouth and swallow it
- drink /drɪŋk/ take water, milk, tea and so on into your mouth and swallow it
Writing
Four sentences about your food: what you like, what you don't eat, what there is in your fridge.
Example
I like bread and cheese. I don't eat meat. There is some milk in my fridge. I drink tea in the morning.
Checklist
Practise this lesson in the other sections
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