Mon oncle veut une salade avec du maïs, des noix et quelques amandes grillées.

Because oncle is a masculine singular noun in French, so the correct possessive is mon.

French possessives agree with the thing possessed, not with the owner:

• mon = my + masculine singular noun
• ma = my + feminine singular noun
• mes = my + plural noun

So:

• mon oncle = my uncle
• ma tante = my aunt
• mes oncles = my uncles

Une salade usually means a salad as a dish or serving.

So here, veut une salade means your uncle wants one salad.

By contrast, de la salade often refers more generally to some lettuce/salad as a substance or ingredient.

Compare:

• Je veux une salade. = I want a salad.
• Je veux de la salade. = I want some salad / some lettuce.

In this sentence, the person wants a complete salad with ingredients, so une salade is the natural choice.

Du maïs uses the partitive article, which is often used for something seen as an uncountable quantity or an ingredient.

Here, maïs is being treated like a food item added to the salad, similar to:

• du riz = some rice
• du fromage = some cheese
• du maïs = some corn

Du is a contraction of de + le.

So:

• avec du maïs = with some corn

Even though in English we just say corn, French usually needs this article.

Both are possible ways to express an indefinite quantity, but they are not exactly the same.

• des noix = some walnuts/nuts
• quelques amandes = a few almonds / some almonds

The difference is mainly one of nuance:

• des is the normal plural indefinite article, like some
• quelques means a few or some, and often sounds a bit more specific or limited

So the sentence is mixing two natural French patterns:

• avec du maïs
• des noix
• quelques amandes grillées

This is completely normal.

Quelques means a few or some.

It is used with a plural noun:

• quelques amandes = a few almonds
• quelques minutes = a few minutes
• quelques amis = a few friends

It suggests a small number, though not always an exact one.

So in this sentence, quelques amandes grillées means something like a few roasted almonds.

Grillées is an adjective meaning grilled or roasted, and it describes amandes.

In French, adjectives often come after the noun, so:

• amandes grillées = roasted almonds

It has -ées because it must agree with amandes, which is:

• feminine
• plural

So:

• singular masculine: grillé
• singular feminine: grillée
• plural masculine: grillés
• plural feminine: grillées

Since amande is feminine, and amandes is plural, the correct form is grillées.

It describes just the almonds.

The structure is:

• du maïs
• des noix
• quelques amandes grillées

So grillées is attached to amandes, not to salade.

If the whole salad were being described as grilled, the sentence would need a different structure, and that would not really make sense here anyway.

Maïs is pronounced roughly like mah-EESS.

The two dots over the i are called a tréma in French. They show that the vowels should be pronounced separately.

Without the tréma, French readers might try to group the vowels differently. The tréma helps show that a and i belong to separate sounds.

So:

• maïs = two vowel sounds, not one blended sound

This is similar to how the tréma works in words like Noël.

Veut means wants and comes from the verb vouloir = to want.

In this sentence:

• Mon oncle veut... = My uncle wants...

Veut is the third-person singular form, used with:

• il veut = he wants
• elle veut = she wants
• mon oncle veut = my uncle wants

A few forms of vouloir in the present tense are:

• je veux = I want
• tu veux = you want
• il/elle veut = he/she wants
• nous voulons = we want
• vous voulez = you want
• ils/elles veulent = they want

Avec means with.

So:

• une salade avec du maïs = a salad with corn
• avec du maïs, des noix et quelques amandes grillées = with corn, nuts, and a few roasted almonds

This is the normal French way to add ingredients or accompanying items.

French uses articles much more often than English does.

In English, you can say:

• with corn, nuts, and roasted almonds

But in French, nouns usually need some kind of determiner or article:

• du maïs
• des noix
• quelques amandes grillées

Leaving the articles out would usually sound ungrammatical in standard French.

So one important habit for English speakers is: in French, nouns usually need a word like un, une, le, la, du, des, quelques, etc.