Dialogue

	In der Gaststätte
Franz	Hallo, Greta! Wie geht's?
Greta	Sehr gut. Ich bin hungrig.
Franz	Ich auch. Möchtest du etwas essen?
Greta	Ja!
Greta	Ich möchte Salat, Brot und Wasser.
Franz	Hast du jetzt keinen Hunger?
Greta	Doch, ich habe großen Hunger. Was bekommst du?
Franz	Ich bekomme ein Stück Apfelstrudel und einen Eisbecher.
Greta	Warum das? Du sollst eine Bratwurst nehmen.
Franz	Nein, ich bin zufrieden. Ich habe keinen großen Hunger.
Greta	Ach so, dann ist das genug.
	Nach zwanzig Minuten
Greta	Diese Gaststätte ist schrecklich! Ich möchte etwas zu essen!
Franz	Wir gehen!

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Food!

die Früchte (das Obst) - fruits		das Gemüse - vegetables
die Banane	banana	die Möhre	carrot
die Kirsche	cherry	der Spinat	spinach
die Zitrone	lemon	die Zwiebel	onion
die Erdbeere	strawberry	die Erbsen	peas
die Orange	orange	die Kartoffel	potato
der Apfel	apple	die Tomate	tomato
die Weinbeere; or trauben	grape	der Spargel	asparagus
die Grapefruit	grapefruit	die Bohnen\|\| beans
das Fleisch - meat		die Meeresfrüchte - shellfish, seafood
das Lammfleisch	lamb	die Kammmuschel\|\|scallop
der Truthahn	turkey	die Krabbe \|\|crab
der Schinken	ham	die Garnele	shrimp
das Schweinefleisch	pork	der Fisch - fish
das Hähnchen	chicken	die Sardellen\|\|anchovies
das Rindfleisch	beef	der Lachs	salmon
die Wurst	sausage	der Aal	eel
die Molkereiprodukte - dairy products		Other Foods
die Butter	butter	die Suppe	soup
der Käse	cheese	die Fritten	French fries
die Milch	milk	die Pizza	pizza
der Joghurt	yogurt	der Hamburger	hamburger
die Nachspeise - dessert		der Senf - mustard
das Bonbon	candy	das Brot	bread
die Schokolade	chocolate	die Butter	butter
die Torte	cake	der Salat	salad
der Kuchen	cake	der Pfeffer	pepper
der Apfelstrudel	apple strudel	der Reis	rice
der (Apfel)Kuchen	(apple) pie	das Salz	salt
das Eis\|\|ice cream	der Zucker	sugar
der Eisbecher	bowl of ice cream	die Konfitüre	jam

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Accusative Case

As you know from the Intro, in German, there are four cases. Three are used often. The first, Nominative Case, you learned in Lesson 1. It covers the subject, and the predicate noun (in "He is (noun).", (noun) is the predicate noun). The second, the Accusative Case, you will learn now. It covers the direct object and the prepositions. The third, the Dative Case will be taught later on. It covers the indirect object and the object of many other prepositions.

The object of a sentence will be in accusative case. In, "You hurt me.", 'me' would be accusative.

Note: The Accusative Case and Dative Case are identical in English; that's why German has one case extra. Edit

Articles

	Masculine	Feminine	Neuter	Plural
Definite Article	den	die	das	die
Indefinite Article	einen	eine	ein	-eine*

* The indefinite article for plurals is non-existant. However related words, such as possessives and the kein- words that you will learn later this lesson, will end in eine for plurals.

In the articles, the memory hook for accusative case is "Der goes to den (pronounced "dane") and the rest stay the same.". The masculine indefinite article goes to einen, and everything else stays the same there. Therefore above, der Hamburger goes to den Hamburger and ein Hamburger goes to einen Hamburger when the hamburger is the direct object, such as in "Er hat einen Hamburger." ("He has a hamburger.")

If you are getting confused, it's fine. This topic is one of the hardest for English speakers to grasp. Here are some solutions:

To find out the case of something, first find the verb. The verb rules the sentence. Everything revolves around it. Next you find the subject of the sentence. The subject is the thing/person that is doing the verb. The subject is always in the Nominative Case, so it takes on the der, die, das, die, or ein, eine, ein.

Now you look back at the verb. If it is a being verb (am, are, is, etc.), the next noun after the verb is the predicate noun. An easy way to figure this out is to write an equation. If the verb can be replaced with an equals sign (=), then the following noun is a predicate noun. If it can't be replaced by an equals sign, refer to the next paragraph. The predicate noun is also always in the Nominative Case, so the same rules apply to it.

Ich bin ein Junge. Sie ist eine Frau.

If the verb of the sentence is an action verb (playing, throwing, making, eating), find what the subject is doing the verb to. For example, if the verb is "makes" (macht), you look for what is being made. That is the direct object. The direct object is always in the Accusative Case, so it takes on the den, die, das, die, or einen, eine, ein.

Sie haben den Cheeseburger. Habt ihr einen Salat?

The indefinite articles, when you just look at their endings, select e, -, e for nominative case, and en, e, -, e for accusative.

Remember, between nominative and accusative, the only third-person change is in the masculine form.

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Pronouns

The pronouns experience a much bigger change than the articles. This is also true in English, as the articles (a, an, the) do not change ever, but I goes to me, we goes to us, etc.

Not everything is the same, though. While me is mich and us is uns, the second and third persons undergo different changes. In third person, as in the articles, the only change is in masculine singular. Following the "der goes to den" rule, er goes to ihn when in the accusative case.

The second person in English never changes. In German, du goes to dich and ihr goes to euch. Sie, the formal version of either, stays the same. Remember, Sie (2nd person formal) and sie (3rd person plural) only differ in their meanings and the fact that the former is capitalized and the latter is not. This stays true throughout German grammar.

Here is a tabular representation of the above.

Person Singular Plural
English German English German
1st me mich us uns
2nd you dich you (all) euch
3rd him, her, it ihn, sie, es them sie

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Antecedents

Note: This is just a quick lesson in English grammar applied into German. If you already know all about antecedents in English, skip the first paragraph.

When using a pronoun, you have to know what it is for it to work. There are some rare exceptions, such as in mysteries or drama, but otherwise this is always true. Sometimes in dialogue this is taken care of by pointing or making some other gesture, but most of the time, the pronoun modifies something already mentioned. The object/person mentioned earlier that turns into a pronoun later is called the antecedent.

In German this is very useful. You can't simply say 'it' anymore. Many food words are masculine and feminine, and when you turn them into pronouns, they turn into 'he', 'she', 'him', and 'her', not always 'it'. For example, the sentence "The cheeseburger tastes good. It's very crunchy." turns into "The cheeseburger tastes good. He's very crunchy." Note: You will learn how to say this in German later in this lesson.

Why is it "he"? This is where the antecedent comes in. Because there are foods that are masculine and feminine in German, you can't assume the 'es'. You have to look back at the previous sentence, at the antecedent, der Cheeseburger. "Der Cheeseburger" is replaced by er (since it is the subject, and therefore in Nominative Case). Therefore, all you need to know are these connections: der/den-er/ihn, die-sie, das-es, die-sie.

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Food-Related Verbs

essen (I) - to eat, to be eating, to do eat
trinken - to drink, to be drinking, to do drink
bekommen - to get/receive, to be getting/receiving, to do get/receive
möchten (M) - would like
wollen (M) - to want, to be wanting, to do want

Of these five verbs, only trinken and bekommen are regular. Essen is irregular (that's what the "I" means). Do you remember from the last lesson 'lesen' and 'sehen'? In both of them, the first 'e' changed to 'ie' in the du- and er/sie/es-forms. Well essen experiences the same change, except that it changes to 'i', not 'ie'. Also, it acts the same as 'lesen' in the du-form: You don't have three s's in a row.

Person Singular Plural
1st ich esse wir essen
2nd du isst ihr esst
3rd er/sie/es isst sie essen

Isst sounds and looks a lot like ist. The minute difference happens to be in the way you pronounce the s. When you mean eats it is sometimes an overstressed hissing (i.e. extremely sharp) sound. In normal life Germans, too, can only tell which verb is meant from knowing the context.

Just like in last lesson, where you could say, "Ich spiele gerne Fußball.", you can also extend it to food. "I like to eat cheeseburgers." is translated as "Ich esse gerne Cheeseburger."

The last two verbs (marked (M)) are modals. They will be discussed in the next section.

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Modals

In the introduction, you learned that German has no helping verbs. Instead, they have modals, words that basically do the same thing.

Modals are conjugated very differently from normal verbs. The ich- and er/sie/es-forms are always the same, while the du-form adds an 'st'. Most modals experience a vowel change from singular to plural, and the rest is the same.

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Möchten

Möchten isn't technically a modal, but it acts exactly the same. There is no vowel change, and the ich- and er/sie/es forms are "möchte". Here is the complete conjugation:

Person Singular Plural
1st ich möchte wir möchten
2nd du möchtest ihr möchtet
3rd er/sie/es möchte sie möchten

Möchten means "would like" and can be applied to food (i.e. Ich möchte einen Cheeseburger.). Möchten can be translated even more literally as "would like to", and is traditionally used with an infinitive verb at the end of the sentence (i.e. "Ich möchte jetzt gehen"/"I would like to go now"). However, this infinitive is not neccesary if it's completely obvious what you're talking about (If you say "Ich möchte einen Cheeseburger", everyone will assume that you would like a cheeseburger to eat.)

(Note: Technically, "möchten" is not a word. The above cited conjugation is actually the "Konjunktiv" of "mögen", which has become so popular as a phrase, that even many Germans today aren't aware of it anymore, so you don't need to worry about it. "Etwas mögen" means "to like to", and "I would like" is the closest translation of "ich möchte")

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Wollen

Wollen is a true modal; it even changes vowels. Ich/er/sie/es will and du willst. Here is the complete conjugation:

Person Singular Plural
1st ich will wir wollen
2nd du willst ihr wollt
3rd er/sie/es will sie wollen

Wollen can also be applied to food, but may be considered impolite and demanding ("Ich will einen Cheeseburger!" roughly means "I demand a cheeseburger!" Möchten should be used instead: "Ich möchte einen Cheeseburger!" = "I want a cheeseburger!").

Wollen should not be confused with the future tense, despite the presence of the English word 'will' in the conjugations. However, will can also mean an intent or a document showing what one wants to happen. So it is not so different from 'to want' as possibly originally presumed.

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Modals with other verbs

When you need to use another verb with a modal (such as expressing you would like or want to preform an action), the sentence's word order is somewhat different than it would be in English. In English you would state the subject pronoun (such as "I"), an English equivalent to the modal verb (such as "want"), the action you want to perform (such as "to eat") and then what the action will be performed on (such as "hamburger"), making the sentence "I want to eat a hamburger." In German you must put the action at the end of the sentence, making the sentence "I want a hamburger to eat." ("Ich will einen Hamburger essen.")

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Hunger and Thirst

In German, instead of saying, "I'm hungry.", you say "I have hunger." The same applies to thirst. Here are the German translations:

Hunger - der Hunger

Thirst - der Durst

Like in English, these two words do not have a plural form. When using them, you don't need to worry about the 'der'; you can just say, "Ich habe Hunger." to say "I am hungry".

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Formal Conversations

In Lesson 1, you learned how to talk formally, using phrases like "Guten Morgen!" and "Wie heißen Sie?". There are, however, a few words that are 'survival words' in Germany, specifically

Danke - Thank you, Thanks

Bitte - Please and You're welcome.

To make this even more formal, you can tack on the word 'schön' to the end of "Thank you" and "You're welcome" to make 'dankeschön' and 'bitteschön' (both one word) in response. Schön literally means 'pretty' (you'll relearn this next lesson).

Some other ways to say "thank you": Dankeschön - Thank you very much
Danke sehr - Thanks a lot
Herzlichen Dank ("herzlichen" means sincere or from the heart; you may remember it from "Herzlichen Glückwunsch zum Geburtstag!" last lesson)
Vielen Dank - Thanks a lot
Tausend Dank* - Thanks a million (literally means a thousand, but English is more generous.)
Aufrichtigen Dank* - would be "thank you sincerely" (very formal)

* - You will not be tested on these phrases.

Some other ways to say "You are welcome":

Bitteschön!
Bitte sehr!
Gern geschehen! (Don't mention it)
Gerne!
Kein Problem! (No problem)
Dafür nicht!* - (Do) not (thank me) for this (only used in Northern Germany)

* - You will not be tested on this phrase.

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Kein-words

Twice you have been taught that the ending of the indefinite article for plurals would be eine (for Nominative and Accusative cases), if there was an indefinite article for plurals. Now that lesson applies. The kein-words have the same endings as the ein-words, and they mean the opposite: no, not any, none. For example, "kein Cheeseburger" means "no cheeseburger". "Keine Cheeseburger" (in this case Cheeseburger is plural) means "No cheeseburgers". Notice the 'e' at the end of 'keine'. That's the ending for plurals and feminine nouns and can be likened to the "der, die, das -> die" relationship, where the feminine article serves for the plural as well.

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Ordering at a Restaurant in Germany

das Restaur'ant' (French pronunciation) - Restaurant

beim - at (the)

There are many restaurants you might find in Germany. Much like in English-speaking countries, you would more likely use the name of the restaurant than name what kind of restaurant. If you want to address the wish to eat a certain food, there are two ways:

example: "wanting to eat chinese food"

1. "Ich möchte gerne zum Chinesen." - literally: "I want to go to the Chinese (restaurant)." 2. "Ich möchte gerne chinesisch essen (gehen)." - literally: "I want to (go) eat Chinese (style)."

Here are some more restaurants you can find in Germany:

Chinese food: "zum Chinesen" / "chinesisch essen"
Japanese food: "zum Japaner" / "japanisch essen"
American food: "zum Amerikaner" / "amerikanisch essen"
Mexican food: "zum Mexikaner" / "mexikanisch essen"
Arabic food: "zum Araber" / "arabisch essen"
Italian food: "zum Italiener" / "italienisch essen"
Indian food: "zum Inder" / "indisch essen"
French food: "zum Franzosen" / "französisch essen"
Greek food: "zum Griechen" / "griechisch essen"
Turkish food: "zum Türken" / "türkisch essen"

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Accusative case prepositions

You read at the beginning of this lesson that the Accusative Case covers the direct object and the objects of some prepositions. Here are those prepositions that always fall under Accusative Case

Durch - through

Für - for

Gegen - against

Ohne - without

Um - at, around

You learned um last lesson, and ohne earlier this lesson. Durch and gegen will be taught in depth later, and für will be taught now.

Up until this point, you have only worried about the Accusative Case in third person. Für, meaning 'for', can and should be used in the first and second persons, too. Here's an example:

"The cheeseburger is for me." - "Der Cheeseburger ist für mich."

As you can see, 'me' is put into accusative case because the preposition is für.

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Saying How Food Tastes

In German (as in English) there are several ways of telling how food tastes. You can do this with 'gut' and 'schlecht' from Lesson 1 to say:

Der Cheeseburger schmeckt gut - The cheeseburger tastes good

Der Cheeseburger schmeckt schlecht - The cheeseburger tastes bad

But this is bland. Hopefully the food has more flavor than the description of it. You can use the following words to more colorfully describe how the cheeseburger tastes:

delicious - lecker

delicious - delikat* (a lot more formal than lecker)

tasty - schmackhaft

juicy - saftig*

crunchy - knackig

crispy - knusprig*

spicy - würzig, pikant

stale, tasteless - fade* (Austria: fad)

salty - salzig

oversalted - versalzen*

sweet - süß

bitter - bitter

sour - sauer

creamy - cremig*

hot (in the sense of "very spicy") - scharf

hot (in the sense of "very warm") - heiß

burnt - angebrannt*

cold - kalt

disgusting - schrecklich

* - You will not be tested on these descriptors.

Schmecken is a regular verb. Here is it's conjugation:

Person Singular Plural
1st ich schmecke wir schmecken
2nd du schmeckst ihr schmeckt
3rd er/sie/es schmeckt sie schmecken

The first and second persons really shouldn't be used. No one is going to say, "You guys taste salty" or "I taste creamy" (at least hopefully). So the only forms you need to know are er/sie/es schmeckt and sie (plural) schmecken.

You can use 'schmeckt' and 'schmecken' or 'ist' and 'sind' to state how the food tastes. Just use whichever one you would use in English and it'll be correct.

Although the English meaning of schmecken is simply to taste, "Schmeckt der Cheeseburger?" can be taken in a positive way to mean "Do you like the cheeseburger?". In other words, schmecken alone can mean to taste good.

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Dieser-forms

"The cheeseburger tastes good." does not sound that specific as to which cheeseburger you are talking about. You could be talking about some other cheeseburger than the one in front of you. It just isn't clear. Now, if you said, "This cheeseburger tastes good.", it would be obvious that you're talking about the cheeseburger you're eating. 'Dieser' is the German translation for 'this': "Dieser Cheeseburger schmeckt gut."

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Dieser

Dieser is a special adjective. It changes forms in different situations: different genders and different cases. It can also mean 'these' when modifying a plural. Here are its forms:

Masculine Feminine Neuter Plural
Nominative Case dieser diese dieses diese
Accusative Case diesen diese dieses diese

As you can see, dieser is only appropriate for modifying masculine nouns in nominative case. But 'Cheeseburger', which is masculine, is the subject of the sentence, "Dieser Cheeseburger schmeckt gut." So it is correct in that circumstance.

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Jeder

Jeder means 'every'. It acts exactly like 'dieser' in its endings, so it should be easy to remember. Here are the different forms:

Masculine Feminine Neuter
Nominative Case jeder jede jedes
Accusative Case jeden jede jedes

Notice the absence of the plural form. When you think about this, it's the same in English: no one says 'every books'.

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Welcher

'Welcher' is the third of this threesome of adjectives. 'Welcher' means 'which' and is used like the other interrogatives (wer, was, wann, wo, warum, wie, and welcher). However, because the general subject has to be specified welcher must be inflected before use: "Welcher Hamburger ist seine?" Its forms have the same endings as 'dieser'.

Masculine Feminine Neuter Plural
Nominative Case welcher welche welches welche
Accusative Case welchen welche welches welche

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Connection with Time

You might want to say 'every day', 'this week', 'every morning', or 'which Tuesday night?'. But to do this, not only do you need to know the jeder-forms, but also the genders of the times and the cases. The second one is easy: Whenever you do something at a certain time, that time is put into Accusative Case. Last lesson, you learned the gender of one time: der Tag. So now you know everything to say 'diesen Tag', 'jeden Tag', and 'welchen Tag?' (this day, every day, and which day?).

Masculine Feminine Neuter

When extending to 'which Tuesday night?', remember that the night stays feminine on Tuesday, so it stays "Welche Dienstagnacht?". Likewise, you can say 'every June' the same as 'every month': 'jeden Juni'.

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This and That

Ich möchte einen Cheeseburger. Der schmeckt sehr gut.

Ich esse jeden Tag Cheeseburger. Die habe ich gern.

Look at the second sentence of each of these German dialogues. What's missing? That's right, instead of "Der Cheeseburger schmeckt sehr gut." and "Die Cheeseburger habe ich gern.", both of the 'Cheeseburger's, so to speak, are dropped. We're left with just the articles, only in this case, they aren't articles. They're demonstrative pronouns'.

Demonstrative pronouns aren't scary. They're just the same as the normal pronouns, only they give more oomph to the sentence. They can be translated as either 'this' or 'that' ("I'd like a cheeseburger. That tastes very good."), or 'these' or 'those' for plurals ("I eat cheeseburgers every day. These I like.").

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Money and Paying

Germany, Austria, Luxemburg, Belgium and Südtirol – in other words: all German speaking regions except Switzerland and Liechtenstein– have given up their former currencies and adopted the Euro as of 1999. One Euro is worth 100 Cents. Because they are not members of the European Union, Switzerland and Liechtenstein have kept the Swiss Francs (Franken = 100 Rappen).

'Euro' normally does not change in the plural in German, so you would still say "Ich habe 500 Euro." Nevertheless, there is an exception: Euro coins. If you say "Ich habe vier Euros.", you actually are saying that you have four 1-Euro coins. Because the backsides of euro coins look different in each country, many people in Europe have started collecting foreign euro coins. In this case you can say "Ich habe irische Euros." (I have Irish euro coins.) for example.

There is not yet a rule whether or not the word "Cent" has a different plural form. The majority of Germans are using the word "Cent" as a plural form, but when they don't it is simply "Cents".

In German "euro" is pronounced ‘oi-ro, not you-ro. For "Cent" there are two pronunciations: you can either pronounce it as in English or you say "tzent". The latter version seems to be preferred by older people.

When at a restaurant, you will want to pay at the end. You can use this vocabulary to help you.

to pay - zahlen

the bill - die Rechnung

the waiter - der Ober

"How much is that?" - "Was macht das?" ("What does that make?")

To ask for the bill you can say, "Bitte zahlen!", or make it a complete sentence: "Ich möchte zahlen!", or "Wir möchten/wollen zahlen!". You can also say, "(Herr Ober), die Rechnung bitte!"

Tags for "1.03 Essen"

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