yemek and içmek are the two verbs you reach for at every meal, and they make a tidy pair worth learning together. They share the same grammar — both govern an accusative object when it is specific, and a bare one when it is generic — but each hides a surprise for English speakers. yemek is both a verb and a noun: it means "to eat" and "food / meal / dish," which produces the famous double yemek yemek ("to eat a meal"). And içmek means not only "to drink" but also "to smoke" — sigara içmek is literally "to drink a cigarette." Get these two right and you can order, refuse, and describe a meal fluently.
yemek: an irregular stem
yemek ("to eat") has the stem ye-, but it is one of a tiny group of verbs (with demek, "to say") whose stem changes before a vowel-initial suffix: ye- becomes yi-. So the present continuous is yiyorum (not *yeyorum) and the future is yiyeceğim (not *yeyeceğim). Before consonant-initial suffixes the stem stays ye-: past yedim, aorist yerim.
| Tense / form | "I" form | "he/she/it" form |
|---|---|---|
| Present continuous -(I)yor | yiyorum | yiyor |
| Aorist -(A/I)r | yerim | yer |
| Past -DI | yedim | yedi |
| Future -(y)AcAK | yiyeceğim | yiyecek |
| Evidential -mIş | yemişim | yemiş |
Sabahtan beri bir şey yemedim, açlıktan ölüyorum.
I haven't eaten anything since this morning — I'm starving.
Akşama balık yiyeceğiz, pazardan taze aldım.
We're going to have fish tonight — I got it fresh from the market.
içmek: regular, but watch the past tense
içmek ("to drink") has the stem iç- and is regular, with one spelling point: the stem ends in the voiceless ç, so the past suffix surfaces as -ti, giving içtim ("I drank"), not *içdim. The aorist is the regular içer.
| Tense / form | "I" form | "he/she/it" form |
|---|---|---|
| Present continuous -(I)yor | içiyorum | içiyor |
| Aorist -(A/I)r | içerim | içer |
| Past -DI | içtim | içti |
| Future -(y)AcAK | içeceğim | içecek |
| Evidential -mIş | içmişim | içmiş |
Her sabah aç karnına bir bardak ılık su içerim.
Every morning I drink a glass of warm water on an empty stomach.
Çayını iç, soğuyor, yoksa bir taze demleyeyim mi?
Drink your tea, it's getting cold — or shall I brew a fresh one?
Accusative for specific, bare for generic
This is the shared grammar point and the one English speakers stumble on. Both verbs govern the accusative -(y)I when the object is specific or definite, and leave it bare when it is generic or indefinite. The distinction is meaningful, not optional:
Elmayı yedim— "I ate the apple" (a specific, known apple — accusative).Elma yedim— "I ate an apple / I ate some apple / I ate apple(s)" (generic, not pinned down — bare).
Buzdolabındaki son dilim pizzayı kim yedi?
Who ate the last slice of pizza in the fridge?
Öğlen çorba içtim, ağır bir şey istemedim.
I had soup at lunch — I didn't want anything heavy.
In the first sentence pizzayı is a specific, identifiable slice, so it takes the accusative. In the second, çorba is generic ("some soup, soup as a category"), so it stays bare. The same logic governs both verbs identically, which is exactly why it pays to learn them together: one rule covers eating and drinking.
X-(y)I); if it would say "ate X / ate some X," leave it bare. Muzu yedim ("I ate the banana") versus muz yedim ("I ate a banana / I had bananas"). The same test works for içmek.yemek the verb meets yemek the noun
Here is the wrinkle that surprises everyone: yemek is also the noun meaning "food, meal, dish." So "to eat a meal" comes out as yemek yemek — the noun yemek ("meal") as the bare generic object of the verb yemek ("to eat"). It is not a typo or a stutter; it is the normal way to say "to have a meal / to eat."
Akşam yemeği yedik mi yorgunluktan hemen uyuyorum.
Once we've had dinner, I fall asleep straight away from tiredness.
Dışarıda yemek yemeyi çok seviyorum ama pahalı oluyor.
I love eating out, but it gets expensive.
The noun yemek also appears in everyday compounds: kahvaltı is breakfast, but öğle yemeği ("midday meal") is lunch and akşam yemeği ("evening meal") is dinner — both built on the noun yemek with a possessive. And yemek pişirmek is "to cook" (literally "to cook food").
Bu akşam yemeği ben yaparım, sen otur dinlen.
I'll make dinner tonight — you sit down and rest.
içmek the drink-and-smoke verb
içmek covers both drinking and smoking. sigara içmek ("to smoke a cigarette," literally "to drink a cigarette") is the standard phrase — Turkish does not have a separate verb for smoking in ordinary speech. The same verb stretches to other inhaled or consumed substances.
Burada sigara içmek yasak, dışarı çıkman gerek.
Smoking is forbidden here — you'll have to go outside.
Babam yıllar önce sigarayı bıraktı, artık hiç içmiyor.
My dad gave up cigarettes years ago — he doesn't smoke at all now.
Note the accusative/bare contrast carries over: sigara içmek (generic, "to smoke") versus sigarayı bırakmak ("to quit the cigarette habit," where sigarayı is the definite, generic-as-institution object). Both are idiomatic and very common.
Common mistakes
❌ Pizzayı yedim.
Incorrect when you just mean you had some pizza, not a specific slice — generic 'I ate pizza' should be bare: pizza yedim. The accusative pins it to a specific pizza.
✅ Pizza yedim.
I ate pizza / I had some pizza.
❌ Yeyorum şu an.
Incorrect — the stem ye- becomes yi- before a vowel-initial suffix: yiyorum.
✅ Yiyorum şu an.
I'm eating right now.
❌ İçdim çayı.
Incorrect — the voiceless ç forces -ti in the past: içtim. Also a specific tea is çayı; word order çayı içtim.
✅ Çayı içtim.
I drank the tea.
❌ Sigara fumalıyorum.
Incorrect — there's no borrowed 'smoke' verb; smoking is içmek: sigara içiyorum.
✅ Sigara içiyorum.
I'm smoking a cigarette.
❌ Yemek istiyorum.
Ambiguous if you mean 'I want to eat a meal' — said once, yemek reads as the bare infinitive 'to eat'; to say 'have a meal' you need yemek yemek: yemek yemek istiyorum.
✅ Yemek yemek istiyorum.
I want to eat (have a meal).
yemek yemek feels strange at first, but say it a few times and it locks in. Remember the two words play different roles: the first is the noun ("meal"), the second is the verb ("to eat"). The same logic gives you yemek pişirmek ("cook food") and akşam yemeği ("dinner").Key takeaways
yemek"to eat" has an irregular stem:ye-→yi-before a vowel (yiyorum,yiyecek);ye-stays before consonants (yedim,yer).içmek"to drink" is regular, but the past isiçtimwith-t-after the voicelessç.- Both take the accusative
-(y)Ion a specific object and stay bare when generic:elmayı yedimvselma yedim. yemekis also the noun "food/meal," giving the doubleyemek yemek("to eat a meal"), plusakşam yemeği,yemek pişirmek.içmekalso means "to smoke":sigara içmek. There is no separate smoking verb in ordinary speech.
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Start learning Turkish→Related Topics
- The Accusative -(y)I and DefinitenessA1 — The accusative ending marks a direct object as specific — and because Turkish has no word for 'the', the accusative effectively IS the definite article.
- Accusative vs Bare Object: DefinitenessA2 — How to decide whether a direct object takes the accusative suffix -(y)I or stays bare — and how that choice carries the meaning of English 'the'.
- Eating Out and FoodA2 — Ordering food, the quasi-obligatory meal blessings Afiyet olsun and Eline sağlık, asking for the bill, and stating dietary needs in Turkish.
- Verb-Noun Collocations by ThemeB2 — Fixed verb-noun pairings clustered by topic — food, money, communication, decisions — where the conventional verb is set per noun and rarely matches English.