Real exam English episode 3 food. Hello and welcome to read exam English. My name is Trevor so today's topic is food which I think is my favourite topic. I'm a complete foodie. I love cooking restaurants, shopping for food and of course eating. OK, so food is a really good opportunity to show off some great vocabulary in the exam. Very often I hear people saying something like. Oh, I like Italy because of the food. Come on, it's a higher level English exam. You have to show off a little bit. Much better to say I like Italy because of the mouth-watering gastronomy or the delicious local delicacies. You know, you got to impress the examiners. So make an effort.
In today's episode we have speakers from four different countries. That's a really nice mix of accents for you. And remember, if you can't follow everything, the transcripts are available over on real exam English.
OK, then let's go with the questions.
Trevor: What do you usually have for breakfast?
Mary(South Africa): I´m pretty bad with breakfast. I´m not a huge breakfast person. I kind of do one meal late in the morning and that kind of tides me over until dinner time. So I´m kind of more of a brunch person me. But if I did do breakfast it´s usually a small bowl of cereal or more often than not it´s a slice of toast or something like that. Not big on breakfast. Sorry….although…except for brunch, which I just love, I love eggs, any form of eggs I´m good with.
Trevor: Ok and what dishes are you good at cooking?
Mary: I cook a lot obviously, every day dishes that the kids will eat are difficult. They are not necessarily things that I would eat. I think I´m pretty ok with cooking most things. I´ve gotten much better at baking recently, since having kids because there´s always a birthday party or cupcakes that need making. But generally I try and keep my cooking simple. I don´t like to use too many dishes in the kitchen because it requires much cleaning but I try do lots of curries, chillies, stir fries, that kind of thing, pasta and then y´know when it´s Winter time it´s kind of casseroles and stews and roast dinners.
Yummy. I think I'd like to go for dinner in that house. There's a lot of dishes there that you would consider to be very typical British dishes and the same in Ireland, where this speaker Mary lives. So she mentioned curries, chilies, stir fries, pasta. Uh, what else did she have? She had casseroles, stews and roast dinners, and so this is very typical in the in the UK or Ireland. You'll notice that these that these dishes are from all over the world really like curries would be from India or perhaps the Caribbean, chilis are from Mexico, stir fries are from Asia, pasta is from Italy, casseroles and stews could be French, Spanish or from any country really I suppose. So that's something that that you'll notice a lot if you go to live in in the UK or in Ireland. Something else I would like to comment on here is these are verbs that she used in the first answer about breakfast. And she said I kind of do one meal late in the morning and that kind of tides me over until dinner time. And this phrasal verb to tide over is used to describe something that you need to help you to get through a difficult period. So in this case, it was a long gap without food, but more typically you would use it with regards to money, so you know someone might say he wanted money to tide him over until the end of the month when he gets paid. OK, so that's a really nice phrasal verb and more of an unusual one.
Trevor: What is you favourite dessert?
Karen(USA): I can just think off the top of my head….oh I know….cake…cake is my favourite dessert, in general. We just had churros yesterday though and I love churros.
Trevor: Would you enjoy cooking food for a large group of people?
Karen: Would I enjoy it?
Trevor: Yea
Karen: No, absolutely not. I don´t enjoy cooking at all. I do it because I have to but I mean, I enjoy being together and everything and I enjoy like the maybe teamwork in cooking part, but the actual cooking I don´t really enjoy at all. If it could be my way it would just be take out with a whole bunch of people.
Considering that speaker is from the United States, then that last answer is not really too surprising. If you've lived in America, then you'll notice that compared to Europe, people tend to cook a far less there, and it's very common to order take out as Karen said. So, take out or take away is when you get food from a restaurant or you get it delivered to your to your house. And I would also just like to mention this expression that she used in the first answer about dessert. She said I can just think off the top of my head. And this expression off the top of my head is used when you haven't really put too much thought into something beforehand. Or perhaps somebody has kind of surprised you with the question. So for example, someone might ask you, I don't know, something like how much do you think a new microphone? And you would say. Off the top of my head, I'd say €50. OK, so you're kind of having a guess. That's when you really don't know.
Trevor: What food or drinks do you think are unhealthy?
Ofordi(UK): I subscribe to the viewpoint that everything in moderation is usually fine for you. So, I don´t think anything is healthy or unhealthy per se, it´s how much of it you have and whether you do exercise and you look after your health, by having a balanced diet as well.
What a nice posh London accent. I love it. And the introduction to this answer was really nice. OK, so it was I subscribed to the viewpoint that everything in moderation is usually fine for you, and this expression I subscribed to the viewpoint is just a fancy way of saying I think. And it's really important to have some different ways to say I think because the nature of the exam is that very often you have to give your opinion. OK. So different things that you can say are I suppose, I reckon, I believe, I guess, I'd say that or if you want to be really fancy, you can copy this one and say I subscribe to the viewpoint that whatever, really nice.
Trevor: When you go to a restaurant, which is more important to you, the atmosphere or the food?
Mike(USA): Well, in my opinion, I would prefer more of the…….of the…ff….I love food so for me food is going to be more important for me than atmosphere. I can go to a bummy, sleazy restaurant but as long as they serve good food I don´t have a problem with that so for me it´s going to be more about the food than the atmosphere itself.
Trevor: Have you ever tried typical food from another country?
Mike: Yea, I´ve tried typical food of places of England, Spain of course, Philippines, Asia, and also like if you lived in American and stuff you get like opportunities to try those types of dishes, those authentic dishes from different cultures and things so yea I´ve been very exposed to different types of food.
Answers there from that speaker who is from California in the USA and we heard some good American vocabulary there, which is I can go to a bummy sleazy restaurant. OK, so bummy sleazy kind of means that the restaurant is of low quality or of low character. And we also heard as long as they serve good food, I don't have a problem with that. And this expression, as long as can be replaced with on the condition that are providing that and is a really good conjunction to use and again, examiners love that, and very often if you're doing a Cambridge B2 or C1 or C2 exam for that matter, then in the use of English Part 2 you will see as space as OK and there are a number of different possibilities. It can be as long as, as well as, as much as as soon as, OK or there are more. And it's important to know the difference between each of those.
Remember, you can get the transcripts for this and every episode on the real exam English pages on Facebook or Instagram, and you can also find lots of great grammar exercises there as well as really useful tips on how to prepare for your exam. And if you want information on classes to prepare for your exam, then you can find that there also.
Trevor: Do you think we should try to eat food that is produced locally?
Emma(Ireland): Definitely, a hundred per cent I would think that. I try to eat food that is produced locally and in season. So, this time of the year in Ireland we have a lot of homegrown vegetables and I would always choose Irish vegetables over imported vegetables and seasonal vegetables over non-seasonal imported vegetables.
Trevor: When you go to a restaurant, which is more important to you, the atmosphere or the food?
Emma: The atmosphere, the food is important but generally I go to a restaurant to be with my Friends and spend some quality time out of the house. So, the atmosphere is definitely more important for me.
Trevor: What differences are there between what young people and older people like to eat?
Emma: Generally, older people would like to eat more traditional foods associated with that particular country that they are originally from. For example, older Irish people would like to eat potatoes, vegetables and meat, just traditional local Irish food. Younger people tend to be more worldly and they´ve travelled a lot so they eat American-style food, they eat Japanese, Mexican, Italian, there´s no limits to the variety of food they may eat.
A few answers there from that speaker who is from Ireland and is my sister in fact, and the first answer was about food being produced locally and there was some really nice vocabulary in this answer. Uh, firstly, she mentioned food that is in season. And if food is in season, then that is the natural time of the year that the food is produced in a particular country. And she also mentioned homegrown vegetables, which is a really nice compound adjective. And examiners love compound nouns and compound adjectives. So if you can get them into your answers, writing or speaking, that's great. OK, so home grown means that they are grown at home. Usually that means in your own house, but in this case it refers to the the home country.
So Ireland in this case, and also there was a variation of in season which was seasonal vegetables and then we also heard about non seasonal vegetables. Vegetables that are not grown naturally at that time of year in whatever particular country and in the last of the answers there was some really nice structures. OK, there was, for example, and it's good to use that, that type of connector for example or for instance or an example of this is. And because it gives a little bit of structure and as usual, examiners love structure. So try to get those in there if possible. And we also heard this really nice word, uh worldly. OK, so the sentence was younger people tend to be more worldly. So if you're more worldly, that means you are kind of more sophisticated and perhaps more well travelled as well. So an example would be something like Maria went away on Erasmus for one year and she came back a much more worldly person. A really nice bit of vocabulary to add to your list there.
Trevor: What is your favourite food?
Lesley(UK): Oh my goodness. That´s a huge question. I´m not sure I have a favourite food because it probably depends on where I am in the world. I really love Japanese food, so I love lots of raw fish and things. If I´m in France I love really beautiful, grilled fish and fresh vegetables and when we´re in the north of England all of that seems to turn into quite a lot of meat.
A really nice, simple, well structured answer there and just to pick up on the expressions at the start that were used to buy a bit of extra time. So the speaker said, Oh my goodness, that's a huge question. OK, so we've spoken about this before that it's good to have some kind of expression or sentences to use that will give you a little bit of extra time so that you can think about what you're going to say and that's a really nice one.
Trevor: It is said that food in expensive restaurants is always better than food in a cheap restaurant. Would you agree?
Ofordi(UK): No, I really wouldn´t agree with that. I think that line that gets wheeled out quite regularly with a couple of other ones but you can have perfectly good quality food in a not very expensive restaurant and that´s been shown time and time again. Again, I think it depends on what you are paying for. If you´re paying a small fortune and it´s a very nice restaurant then you´re not just paying for the food, you´re paying for the service, you´re paying for the decor, you´re paying for various other things. And if that is the kind of experience you want to have while you´re eating then that´s what you´re really paying for but that doesn´t necessarily mean the quality or the cuts of the food that you´re having is better than going to a smaller restaurant.
OK, nice answer there. So there was a really nice expression in the middle of this answer, paying a small fortune and to pay a small fortune means to pay a lot of money. Also in this answer there was some really good vocabulary relating to restaurants. Firstly, there was the service which of course is the people who are serving you the food. Then there was the decor, which is how the place looks. That's the furniture, the cutlery table, clothes, the pictures on the wall. All of that kind of stuff. And then there was the cuts of food. So the cuts would be the parts of the animal or fish perhaps, that the restaurant gets and uses to and uses to prepare the food for you.
OK, that's about it for today's episode. So what you need to think about before your exam is some of your favourite dishes, some local traditional dishes, and you need to consider some general food topics like food production, organic food, vegetarianism. The growth of fast food, OK, and I'd really love to hear from you on social media about this topic as I am such a foodie. Then let me know. Uh, tell me, what do you have for breakfast? What's your favourite food? Uh, tell me anything about food. OK then. Uh, thank you very much. You're listening. I hope you found this episode useful and see you next time.