Breakdown of Raastamme porkkanan sen sijaan että keitämme sen.
se
it / he / she (of a person) / that
keittää
to boil, to cook
sen sijaan että
instead of
porkkana
carrot
raastaa
to grate
Questions & Answers about Raastamme porkkanan sen sijaan että keitämme sen.
English says 'instead of boiling', using an '-ing' word. Why does Finnish use keitämme (we boil)?
The phrase sen sijaan että requires a full clause with a conjugated verb. You are literally saying 'instead of that we boil'. Finnish doesn't use an '-ing' equivalent here.
Why is the carrot in the genitive case (porkkanan) rather than the partitive (porkkanaa)?
Using the genitive makes it a total object. It means we are grating the entire, specific carrot and the action is seen as complete. If we were grating an unspecified amount of carrot, we would use the partitive porkkanaa.
Why is the word for 'it' at the end sen instead of se?
Just like porkkanan, the pronoun sen is the total object of the second verb, keitämme. It takes the genitive case to show that the entire carrot is the target of that alternative action.
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