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Min søster steger grøntsager på en varm pande med lidt smør.

Min søster steger grøntsager på en varm pande med lidt smør.
My sister fries vegetables in a hot pan with a little butter.
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Questions & Answers about Min søster steger grøntsager på en varm pande med lidt smør.

Why is it Min søster and not Min søsteren?

Because Danish normally uses the bare noun after a possessive:

  • min søster = my sister
    You usually don’t add the definite article ending (-en/-et) when there’s a possessive (min, din, hans, hendes, vores, jeres, deres).
    So min søsteren is not standard Danish.
Why is it min and not mit?

Because the possessive agrees with the noun’s gender:

  • min = common gender (en-words)
  • mit = neuter (et-words)
  • mine = plural
    søster is an en-word (en søster), so you use min.
What’s the difference between søster and syster (if I’ve seen that)?

søster is the normal modern Danish spelling. syster can appear in older texts, dialect, or in fixed/poetic style, but a learner should stick with søster.

Why is the verb steger and not steg or stegt?

Because steger is present tense:

  • infinitive: at stege (to fry/roast)
  • present: steger (fries / is frying)
  • past: stegte or steg (both exist depending on usage/verb pattern)
  • participle: stegt (fried)

In this sentence, it’s describing what she does/is doing now (present).

Does steger mean “fries” or “roasts”? Which is correct?

at stege is broader than English fry. It can cover cooking in a pan (frying/sautéing) and sometimes roasting/browning. With på en varm pande (on a hot pan), the natural English idea is fry/sauté.

Why does Danish use på en varm pande (“on a warm pan”) instead of “in a pan”?

Danish often uses på with cooking surfaces/tools to describe where the cooking happens:

  • stegt på pande = cooked in a pan (idiomatically)
    Even though English says in a pan, Danish frequently says på en pande.
Why is it en varm pande and not varme pande or varm panden?

Because en varm pande is indefinite singular with an adjective:

  • en pande = a pan
  • en varm pande = a warm/hot pan

If it were definite (the pan), you’d typically say:

  • den varme pande (the hot pan)
    or sometimes panden (the pan), but with an adjective you usually need den/det/de: den varme pande.
Is varm really “warm,” or does it mean “hot” here?

Literally varm is warm, but in everyday Danish it can cover warm/hot depending on context. With a pan used for frying, varm pande is naturally understood as a hot pan.

Why is grøntsager plural, and what is the singular?

grøntsager is plural (vegetables). The singular is en grøntsag (a vegetable).
Plural often appears because you typically cook multiple vegetables together.

How do you know grøntsager is the object and not the subject?

Danish relies heavily on word order. In a basic main clause:
Subject + verb + object
So Min søster (subject) + steger (verb) + grøntsager (object).
Also, “vegetables fry my sister” doesn’t make sense, so meaning supports it too.

What does lidt mean here, and why not lille?

lidt means a little (bit of) and is the normal word for quantity with mass nouns:

  • lidt smør = a little butter

lille means small and is an adjective used with countable nouns or size:

  • en lille pande = a small pan
    So you don’t say lille smør in this sense.
Why is it med lidt smør and not med et smør?

Because smør (butter) is an uncountable/mass noun in Danish, like in English. You don’t normally count it as one butter. You measure it instead:

  • lidt smør (a little butter)
  • noget smør (some butter)
  • en klat smør (a knob/dollop of butter)
Does med lidt smør mean she’s cooking using butter or serving it with butter?

In this cooking context, med lidt smør is understood as using butter in the pan (as the cooking fat). Danish med can mean “with” in either sense, but here “cooked with a little butter” is the natural reading.

Could the sentence be written without en in på en varm pande?

Yes. Danish often drops the article in set phrases and general statements:

  • på varm pande can sound recipe-like and general (on a hot pan as a method).
    Using på en varm pande makes it more specific: on a (particular) hot pan.
Is the pronunciation of grøntsager and smør tricky? Any tips?

Yes, mainly because of ø and the final sounds. Quick tips:

  • ø is like the vowel in French peu or German schön (but Danish has its own quality).
  • smør: the r affects the vowel; the ending is not a strong “r” like American English.
  • grøntsager: the cluster grønt- can be reduced in fast speech; focus on the grøn part first, then add -tsager.