Word
A salada tem tomate e cebola.
Meaning
The salad has tomato and onion.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Questions & Answers about A salada tem tomate e cebola.
Why are tomate and cebola in the singular here? Wouldn't a salad have multiple tomatoes and onions?
When listing ingredients that are chopped or mixed into a dish, Portuguese often uses the singular form. It refers to the food as a general substance or flavor category, rather than focusing on counting the individual vegetables.
Why isn't there an article before tomate and cebola?
While Portuguese uses definite articles before nouns very often, you drop them when talking about an unspecified amount of something. Because the salad has 'some' tomato and 'some' onion, we just say tem tomate e cebola without the words o or a.
Could I say A salada tem tomates e cebolas instead?
Yes, using the plural is grammatically fine and people will perfectly understand you. However, using the singular for ingredients like this sounds much more natural and is the standard way native speakers express it in Portugal.