На ужин я запеку рыбу с картофелем.

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Breakdown of На ужин я запеку рыбу с картофелем.

• с: with
• на: for
• ужин: the dinner

Questions & Answers about На ужин я запеку рыбу с картофелем.

Why is it на ужин, not something like для ужина?

На ужин is the normal Russian way to say for dinner in the sense of as the dinner meal or for tonight’s dinner.

• На завтрак = for breakfast
• На обед = for lunch
• На ужин = for dinner

So На ужин я запеку рыбу с картофелем means something like For dinner, I’ll bake fish with potatoes.

Для ужина is possible in some contexts, but it sounds less natural here. It usually means for the purpose of dinner or intended for dinner, not the usual everyday way to introduce what someone will cook.

Why is the verb запеку and not пеку?

Запеку is the 1st person singular future of the perfective verb запечь.

Russian uses aspect very strongly:

• печь = to bake, be baking, bake in general (imperfective)
• запечь = to bake something completely / to bake as a single finished action (perfective)

Because the sentence talks about one future completed action, Russian uses the perfective future:

• я запеку = I will bake

If you said я пеку, that usually means I am baking or I bake in a habitual sense, not I will bake.