Word
Il surveille la casserole tout en cuisinant.
Meaning
He watches the saucepan while cooking.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Lesson
Breakdown of Il surveille la casserole tout en cuisinant.
il
he
cuisiner
to cook
surveiller
to supervise
tout en
while / even while (+ present participle)
Questions & Answers about Il surveille la casserole tout en cuisinant.
Why use tout en here instead of just en?
Could tout en cuisinant refer to someone else doing the cooking while he watches?
No. A strict rule for using en or tout en with a present participle is that the action must be performed by the subject of the main verb. Here, Il (he) must be the one doing both the watching and the cooking.
Is casserole a false friend here?
Why use surveille instead of regarde for "watches"?
Regarder simply means to look at something. Surveiller means to monitor or keep an eye on something to make sure nothing goes wrong, which is exactly what you do when watching a pot on the stove so it doesn't boil over.