Breakdown of L'enfant pour qui je cuisine ne digère que le soja.
je
I
l'enfant
the child
qui
who
pour
for
ne
not (used before the verb)
que
what (unstressed)
cuisiner
to cook
le
him, it (masculine direct object pronoun)
digérer
to digest
le soja
the soy
Questions & Answers about L'enfant pour qui je cuisine ne digère que le soja.
Why do we use pour qui instead of pour lequel here?
When a relative pronoun follows a preposition (like pour, avec, or sans) and refers to a person (here, l'enfant), it is standard to use qui. You could technically use pour lequel, but pour qui is much more common and natural for people. If the word referred to an object or concept, you would be forced to use pour lequel (or its forms like laquelle, etc.).
Could I use seulement instead of the ne ... que structure?
Yes, you could say L'enfant pour qui je cuisine digère seulement le soja. Both mean exactly the same thing. However, the ne [verb] que construction is extremely common in everyday French to express restriction. Notice that ne goes before the conjugated verb and que goes directly before the specific element being restricted (here, le soja).
Why is it le soja and not just soja?
English often drops the article for general substances or categories of food (like "soy" or "meat"), but French almost always requires the definite article (le, la, les). Because the sentence talks about soy as a broad category of food the child can eat, you must include the article and say le soja.
Why does digère have a grave accent (è) when the infinitive is digérer?
Verbs ending in -érer (like digérer, espérer, or préférer) change their penultimate accent from acute (é) to grave (è) in the present tense for the je, tu, il/elle/on, and ils/elles forms. This spelling change reflects how the pronunciation shifts when the vocal stress falls on that specific syllable.
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