À condition que le four fonctionne, nous ferons du saumon avec du chou-fleur demain soir.

À condition que means provided that, as long as, or on condition that.

It introduces a condition that must be true for the main action to happen:

• À condition que le four fonctionne, nous ferons du saumon...
• Provided that the oven works, we’ll make salmon...

It is a fairly standard and natural way to express a condition in French, especially in slightly more careful or formal speech.

Because à condition que and si do not work in exactly the same way.

• si means if
• à condition que means provided that / as long as

So:

• Si le four fonctionne, nous ferons du saumon. = If the oven works, we’ll make salmon.
• À condition que le four fonctionne, nous ferons du saumon. = Provided that the oven works, we’ll make salmon.

The second version sounds a bit more like the oven working is a required condition.

Also, à condition que is normally followed by the subjunctive, while si is not.

Yes. À condition que normally requires the subjunctive.

So after à condition que, French uses a subjunctive verb form because the condition is uncertain or hypothetical.

With fonctionner, the il form of the present subjunctive is:

• qu’il fonctionne

But here is the tricky part: for many -er verbs, the present subjunctive and the present indicative look exactly the same in some forms.

So:

• Indicative: il fonctionne
• Subjunctive: qu’il fonctionne

They are spelled the same, but the grammar is different. In this sentence, it is subjunctive because à condition que requires it.

Nous ferons is the simple future of faire and means we will make.

It is used because the action is planned for the future:

• demain soir = tomorrow evening

So the timeline is:

• condition: if/provided that the oven works
• result in the future: we will make salmon with cauliflower tomorrow evening

French often uses the future tense in this kind of sentence when the result clearly refers to a future event.

Because nous faisons means we do / we are doing / we make in the present, while nous ferons means we will make in the future.

Since the sentence includes demain soir, the action is clearly in the future, so ferons is the natural choice.

• nous faisons = present
• nous ferons = future

French usually needs an article where English often uses no article.

Here, du saumon is a partitive article, meaning some salmon.

So:

• du saumon = some salmon
• du chou-fleur = some cauliflower

In English, we often just say salmon or cauliflower with no article, but in French you normally need one when talking about an unspecified quantity of food.

Compare:

• Nous mangerons du saumon. = We’ll eat salmon.
• Nous mangerons le saumon. = We’ll eat the salmon.
  This would refer to a specific salmon already known in the context.

For the same reason: it is an unspecified amount of a food item, so French uses the partitive article.

• du chou-fleur = some cauliflower

Even though English just says with cauliflower, French normally says avec du chou-fleur.

Note that chou-fleur is masculine singular, so the partitive article is du.

Not necessarily. Avec simply means with.

In a food context, du saumon avec du chou-fleur can mean:

• salmon served with cauliflower
• salmon accompanied by cauliflower
• salmon and cauliflower as the meal

It does not automatically mean they are physically mixed together. Context decides that.

That placement is very natural in French. Time expressions like demain soir often come at the end.

So this order is completely normal:

• À condition que le four fonctionne, nous ferons du saumon avec du chou-fleur demain soir.

You could sometimes move time expressions for emphasis, but the end position is the most neutral and common here.

Yes, sometimes. For example:

• Demain soir, à condition que le four fonctionne, nous ferons du saumon avec du chou-fleur.
• À condition que le four fonctionne, demain soir nous ferons du saumon avec du chou-fleur.

These are grammatically possible, but the original sentence sounds very natural and straightforward.

French often puts extra information such as time at the end unless there is a reason to emphasize it.

French, like English, can put the condition either before or after the main clause.

So both patterns are possible:

• À condition que le four fonctionne, nous ferons...
• Nous ferons..., à condition que le four fonctionne.

Starting with the condition is common because it sets the frame for the rest of the sentence. English does the same:

• Provided that the oven works, we’ll make...

So this word order should not feel strange; it is actually very parallel to English.

Yes, very naturally.

• À condition que le four marche...
• À condition que le four fonctionne...

Both mean provided that the oven works.

There is a slight nuance:

• marcher is very common in everyday speech for machines and appliances: to work
• fonctionner is a bit more formal or technical: to function

Both are correct here.

Yes. Le four is the standard word for oven.

Examples:

• un four électrique = an electric oven
• un four à micro-ondes = a microwave oven

So le four fonctionne simply means the oven is working.

Because demain soir is a fixed time expression meaning tomorrow evening.

French often uses time expressions like this without an article:

• demain = tomorrow
• ce soir = tonight / this evening
• demain soir = tomorrow evening

This is similar to English, where you also do not say the tomorrow evening.

You could translate it literally that way, but it would sound less natural in English.

A more natural English version would be:

• Provided that the oven works...
• As long as the oven works...
• If the oven works...

So although fonctionne is related to functions, the best English translation in normal speech is usually works.

The comma is standard and helpful because the sentence begins with a subordinate clause:

• À condition que le four fonctionne, nous ferons...

It separates the condition from the main clause, just as in English:

• Provided that the oven works, we’ll make...

In informal writing, punctuation may vary, but with this structure the comma is the normal choice.

The infinitive is faire = to do / to make.

Yes, it is irregular in the future:

• je ferai
• tu feras
• il/elle fera
• nous ferons
• vous ferez
• ils/elles feront

So nous ferons means we will do / we will make.

In this sentence, faire du saumon means to make/cook salmon.

Because with meals and dishes, French often uses faire in the sense of make, prepare, or cook.

So:

• faire du saumon = make / prepare / cook salmon

This is very common in everyday French:

• faire à manger = to make food / cook
• faire un gâteau = to make a cake
• faire des pâtes = to make pasta

Yes. Nous cuisinerons du saumon is also possible and means we’ll cook salmon.

But nous ferons du saumon is very idiomatic and common in everyday French, especially when talking about what meal you are going to prepare.

So:

• faire du saumon = very natural
• cuisiner du saumon = also correct, slightly more specifically focused on cooking

It is normally written with a hyphen: chou-fleur.

Its plural is:

• des choux-fleurs

In this sentence it is singular because it refers to cauliflower as a food item in a general, uncountable sense:

• du chou-fleur

Because du saumon refers to salmon as a food substance, not to a counted number of fish or portions.

French treats it like an unspecified quantity:

• du saumon = some salmon

If you wanted to count individual pieces, you would use a different structure, for example:

• deux morceaux de saumon = two pieces of salmon
• des filets de saumon = salmon fillets

So singular saumon here is completely normal.

Yes. A more everyday version might be:

• Si le four marche, on fera du saumon avec du chou-fleur demain soir.

Differences:

• si instead of à condition que = simpler if
• marche instead of fonctionne = more conversational
• on instead of nous = very common in spoken French for we

The original sentence is still perfectly natural, but slightly more careful in tone.