Quan el menjar és massa salat, la meva mare hi posa una patata i el gust canvia.

In Catalan, possessives are very often used with a definite article:

• la meva mare = my mother
• el meu pare = my father
• la meva casa = my house

This is normal Catalan grammar. English usually does not use an article before a possessive, but Catalan often does.

A few common exceptions are:

• in direct address: Mare!
• in some fixed expressions or very formal/literary style

So la meva mare is exactly what you would expect in an everyday sentence.

Here, menjar is a noun and means food.

You can tell because it has the article el in front of it:

• el menjar = the food

As a verb, menjar means to eat. So this is one of those Catalan words that can be both:

• menjar = to eat
• el menjar = the food

Because salat agrees with el menjar, and menjar is masculine singular.

In Catalan, adjectives usually agree in gender and number with the noun they describe:

• el menjar salat = the salty food
• la sopa salada = the salty soup
• els plats salats = the salty dishes

So in el menjar és massa salat, the adjective has to be salat.

Massa means too or overly here.

So:

• massa salat = too salty

It comes before the adjective, which is normal in Catalan:

• massa car = too expensive
• massa difícil = too difficult
• massa tard = too late

So és massa salat is the natural way to say is too salty.

Hi is a very common Catalan pronoun, and here it means something like in it or into it.

It refers back to el menjar:

• la meva mare hi posa una patata
• literally: my mother puts a potato in it

A fuller version would be something like:

• la meva mare posa una patata al menjar

But Catalan often replaces that location/complement with hi.

This hi does not usually have a neat one-word English equivalent, so it can feel strange at first. In this sentence, just think of it as referring back to the food.

Because unstressed pronouns like hi, en, el, la, li, etc. normally go before a conjugated verb in Catalan.

So you get:

• hi posa
• en parla
• la veu
• li diu

After the verb is common with:

• affirmative imperatives
• infinitives
• gerunds

For example:

• Posa-hi una patata! = Put a potato in it!

But in a normal declarative sentence like this one, hi posa is the correct order.

Quan means when, but in sentences like this it often has the sense of whenever.

So:

• Quan el menjar és massa salat...
  = When/Whenever the food is too salty...

This suggests a habitual or repeated situation.

If you used Si instead:

• Si el menjar és massa salat...

that would mean If the food is too salty..., which sounds more like a condition or possibility.

Both can be grammatical, but the nuance is different:

• quan = whenever this happens
• si = if this happens

Here quan fits well because the sentence describes something the mother regularly does.

Catalan often uses the definite article where English might not.

So el gust here means the taste or the flavor.

Catalan likes the article with many nouns, including ones that English sometimes leaves bare. In this sentence, el gust refers to the taste of the food as a whole.

So:

• el gust canvia = the taste changes

This is perfectly natural Catalan.

Because the sentence is describing a general truth, habit, or usual reaction.

Catalan uses the present tense for this just like English often does:

• When food is too salty, my mother puts a potato in it and the taste changes.

It is not necessarily talking about one specific moment right now. It is describing what generally happens.

Because the subject of the verb is el gust, which is singular.

• el gust canvia = the taste changes

The verb agrees with the subject, not with another nearby noun like patata or menjar.

So:

• el gust canvia = singular subject, singular verb
• els gustos canvien = plural subject, plural verb

Yes, literally it means one potato.

• una = a / one
• patata = potato

Also, patata is feminine, so the article is una, not un.

In real-life usage, the sentence suggests putting a potato into the dish to absorb some salt, which is a common cooking idea in some places. Grammatically, though, it is simply the normal indefinite article plus the noun:

• una patata = a potato