To sa truskawki , To jest chleb. Difference between the two?

The question in my polish book is: Co to jest sa jedzenie?

And for Truskawki the answer is : To sa truskawki.

The answer for Chelb is: To jest chelb.


My question is: Why is "sa" used for "truskawki" and "jest" used for "chleb" ?

Because there's one chleb and many truskawki...

Ahh ,that cleared a few things for me ,this stupid book shows picture of a big pile of bread ,but uses the word for one bread. :)

Dziekuje za pomoc :)

It might be of interest but there is a connection between the English word loaf and the slavonic word chleb. Jest is the singular and the use of sa is the plural from the verb byc, to be. In Danish similar examples would be Han hjaelper sin mor and Hun hjaelper sine venner.

truskawka - single form
to jest truskawka. (Just one fruit).

truskawki - plural form or general meaning. More common, because usually nobody talks about single strawberry fruit.
To są truskawki.




chleb - singular or general meaning. Usually if you think about bread you think about single loaf of bread.

Chleby - plural form (a couple of loafs)

To jest chleb. This is bread. (or) This is a loaf of bread

To są chleby. These are loafs of bread.




Some words which are non count noun in English are countable in Polish and opposite way.

Because bread (chleb) means a single loaf of bread or bread in general.

So you can say;

To jest chleb (This is a loaf of bread) if you point to a single loaf of bread.
or
To jest chleb (This is bread) if you think about bread in general as a noncountable noun. Like water.
Book uses correct word, but intention was to emphasize kind of food and not a loafs of bread.

if you want to emphasize loafs of bread you should say "to są chleby".

Both sentences "to jest chleb" and "to są chleby" under picture are correct, but meaning of them is different.

The concept is exactly the same in Danish.

One more thing. The question is not "sa" it should be "za" and in that case means "that". The verb in the qestion is "jest".

I hope i explained clear ;).

Ohhh, ok, i misinterpreted what you wrote, you haven't made that mistake, stupid me :)

You only made an unimportant spelling mistake.

Co to jest za jedzenie.

What kind of food is it.

jedzenie (food) is non-count nounf, so question start with Co to jest .....


za is used in this context as what kind of ...

Co to jest za jedzenie?
Co to SĄ za truskawki? truskawki are plural so, Co to są... instead of Co to jest...

Compare

Co to są za jabłka? What kind of apples are they? Co to jest za rodzaj jabłek?
Co to są jabłka? What are apples ?


Co to jest za jedzenie? What kind of food is it? Co to jest za rodzaj jedzenia?
Co to jest jedzenie? What is food?

I thought the question was-what is the difference between jest and sa i.e. the verb byc in the singular and then in the plural form. Co to jest za does not figure in the original question anywhere.

Yes, I know.
So I explained that before.
I also attached explanation for word 'za' which here has completely different meaning that it is usually, if we started talking about that.

to sa refere to plural like there are the strawberries
to jest chleb - this is the bread

what if you were asking "where is the bread?" could you say "gdzie jest chleb?" or would you have to use plural?

you'd ask it the way you wrote it

Yes.
the same way you will ask where is water / gdzie jest woda

and not where are waters
bread is non-countable if you are not thinking about loafs.

if you buy two loafs of bread somebody eventually can ask you:
Where did you put breads (because you bought two of them).

ok I understand better now! Thanks :)

Two loafs of bread is something like Dwa bochenek chleb?

Dwa bochenki chleba

bochenek in plural is bochenki
and it requires genitive case that's why you need "chleba" (chleb is nominative/accusative)

but in a shop/bakery, I would simply say: Poproszę dwa chleby (literally "Two breads, please") just like you say "dwa piwa" instead of "dwie butelki/puszki piwa" ("two beers" instead of "two bottles/cans of beer")

Great! I acctually feel i learn more from this forum than my books , here you get an explanation.