Kelnerka podaje nam zupę dnia i wodę.

Kelnerka means waitress, while kelner means waiter. The sentence specifically uses the feminine noun, so it tells you the server is female.

This noun ends in -ka, which is a very common feminine ending in Polish:

• kelner = waiter
• kelnerka = waitress

Podaje is the 3rd person singular present tense of podawać.

Here it means something like:

• serves
• is serving
• literally sometimes gives/handing over, depending on context

So Kelnerka podaje nam zupę dnia i wodę means the waitress serves us the soup of the day and water.

Polish present tense often covers both English simple present and present continuous:

• podaje = serves / is serving

Because nam is the dative case form of my (we/us), and after podawać the person receiving something is often in the dative.

So the pattern is:

• someone serves something
• to someone

In Polish:

• kelnerka = subject
• podaje = verb
• nam = to us
• zupę dnia i wodę = the things being served

Compare:

• my = we
• nas = us (often accusative/genitive, depending on use)
• nam = to us

So here nam is correct because we are the recipients.

Because both nouns are in the accusative case, which is used here for the direct objects of the verb podaje.

The base forms are:

• zupa = soup
• woda = water

In the accusative singular, many feminine nouns ending in -a change to -ę:

• zupa → zupę
• woda → wodę

So:

• Kelnerka podaje zupę = The waitress serves soup
• Kelnerka podaje wodę = The waitress serves water

Because zupę is the direct object of the sentence, so zupa has to go into the accusative: zupę.

The phrase zupa dnia means soup of the day, but when the whole phrase becomes the object, only the main noun changes case as needed:

• nominative: zupa dnia
• accusative: zupę dnia

The second word, dnia, stays in the genitive because it depends on zupa in the expression zupa dnia.

So:

• To jest zupa dnia. = This is the soup of the day.
• Kelnerka podaje zupę dnia. = The waitress serves the soup of the day.

Dnia is the genitive singular of dzień (day).

The expression zupa dnia literally means soup of the day, where Polish uses the genitive for the of relationship.

So:

• dzień = day
• dnia = of the day

This is a very common pattern in Polish:

• koniec dnia = end of the day
• plan dnia = plan of the day / daily schedule
• zupa dnia = soup of the day

Because Polish does not have articles like English a/an and the.

So:

• kelnerka can mean a waitress or the waitress
• zupę dnia can mean the soup of the day
• wodę can mean water, a water, or the water, depending on context

You figure out definiteness from the situation, context, and word order if needed.

No, Polish word order is fairly flexible, because case endings show what each word is doing.

The neutral order here is:

• Kelnerka podaje nam zupę dnia i wodę.

But other orders are possible, for example:

• Nam kelnerka podaje zupę dnia i wodę.
• Zupę dnia i wodę kelnerka podaje nam.

These versions can sound more emphatic or stylistically marked. The original sentence is the most natural neutral version for many contexts.

Yes. I means and.

It joins the two direct objects:

• zupę dnia
• wodę

So the waitress is serving us two things:

1. the soup of the day
2. water

Because both nouns are direct objects, both are in the accusative:

• zupę
• wodę

Podaje comes from podawać, which is imperfective.

In Polish, imperfective verbs are commonly used for:

• ongoing actions
• repeated actions
• general present-tense situations

That makes podaje very natural here: the waitress is in the process of serving us.

The perfective partner is often podać. But perfective verbs generally do not have a normal present tense for current actions; their present forms usually refer to the future.

So:

• podaje = she serves / is serving
• poda = she will serve

The letter ę is a nasal vowel, but in actual speech, especially at the end of a word, it is often pronounced less strongly nasally than learners expect.

Very roughly:

• zupę
• wodę

At word-final position, ę is often pronounced something like e with a nasal quality, and in casual speech many speakers pronounce it quite simply.

The important thing for learners is:

1. recognize that -ę is a real spelling difference and often marks case
2. don’t worry if your nasal pronunciation is not perfect at first

Also, Polish stress is usually on the second-to-last syllable:

• kelNERka
• poDAje
• ZUpę
• WOdę

Yes, if the context already makes it obvious who is being served.

For example:

• Kelnerka podaje zupę dnia i wodę.

That means The waitress serves the soup of the day and water or is serving the soup of the day and water.

Adding nam makes it clear that we are the ones receiving them:

• Kelnerka podaje nam zupę dnia i wodę. = The waitress serves us the soup of the day and water.

Yes, grammatically you could, because daje means gives. But podaje is usually more natural in a restaurant context.

Compare:

• daje = gives
• podaje = serves / hands over / brings to the table

So in this sentence, podaje sounds more idiomatic and specific to serving food and drinks.