First of all, watch the video through to get the gist of what the conversation is about.
Now watch the video more carefully and pay attention to the following:
- Conversation fillers to gain thinking time: Erm; U; okay; you know; Ah, well
- Use of so as a linking word
- Use of adverbs to emphasize adjectives, adverbs and verbs: quite good; quite well; quite nice; very nice; quite hard; really, really soft; just incompatible; I quite like
- Use of actually and really to introduce a bit of surprising information
- Reacting to what you have just heard: Oh, that’s not a bad idea!; Oh, yeah?
- Showing agreement: Oh, no, I’m with you, I like ‘al dente’.; Absolutely
- Use of definitely to emphasize the information
Now it's over to you. Get together with a friend or relative and talk about how good a cook you are and whether your family enjoys the dishes you make. Like Andy, you can tell each other how to prepare your favourite dish. Do not forget to use some of the features of spoken English we have revised in this post.
Andy, let me ask you a question.
Okay, go ahead.
Can you cook?
Yeah, I think I'm a pretty good cook.
Yeah, what do you like to cook?
Erm, I once lived with this guy, this Italian guy, he showed me a few Italian dishes so I think I’m quite good at a couple of Italian dishes, I don’t know how authentic they are, but this one I make with mushrooms, just basically cutting up mushrooms, frying them and then with a bit of onion, a bit of garlic and cooking the pasta at the same time, and then you add some cream to the onions and the mushrooms, and you just leave it cooking for half an hour and it comes out, it comes out quite well, Michael (like um), it’s quite nice, you mix it with the pasta, what I do, I tend to do more than actually need and then I keep… I freeze some and then I can eat it later.
Oh, that’s not a bad idea!
Yeah, …save, a good way of saving money and… yeah, and if you are unfreeze pasta it doesn’t taste too bad. Some food, that you freeze, it’s pretty… like potatoes, have you ever frozen potatoes, then unfrozen them, they’re not very nice, but pasta comes out okay.
Alright, so do you do most of the cooking in your house?
Um at the weekend I cook. What happens is my, my wife doesn't actually like the food I cook, okay,
I like spicy hot food, I like curry, for example the pasta I, I like it ‘al dente’, what I say ‘al dente’…
Oh, yes.
… and it’s quite hard and she likes it really, really soft like soggy and I can’t, I can’t eat that.
Oh, no, I’m with you, I like ‘al dente’.
I can’t eat that, so the whole range of things like that, we are just incompatible, but I like her food though, I eat anything really. They used to call me the dustbin at school ‘cause… when people, you know, we were sitting down for lunch and people had finished, and they hadn’t finished all their food, I would always eat it for them.
Oh, yeah?
So I was constantly battling against my weight ‘cause I’ve got this desire to eat lots of food.
Alright! So… if you’ll eat anything, do you have a favorite, a favorite kinda food?
Ah, well Indian food, definitely I just love curry and… but when I eat Indian food I quite like to eat in a restaurant…
Okay.
And there’s quite a few cheap Indian restaurants here so it’s good.
Absolutely.
