Word
Этот кофе хороший, а этот чай плохой.
Meaning
This coffee is good, but this tea is bad.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Этот кофе хороший, а этот чай плохой.
чай
tea
а
and (contrastive)
кофе
coffee
этот
this [f: эта, n: это]
Questions & Answers about Этот кофе хороший, а этот чай плохой.
Why is the masculine этот used with кофе? Doesn't the -е ending make it neuter?
You are right that most Russian nouns ending in -е or -о are neuter. However, кофе is a famous exception! It is a masculine noun. That is why it takes the masculine demonstrative pronoun этот and the masculine adjective хороший.
Where is the word for 'is' in 'This coffee is good'?
In Russian, the present tense of the verb 'to be' (am, is, are) is almost always left out. You simply put the subject and the adjective together. So, Этот кофе хороший literally translates to 'This coffee [is] good'.
Why does the sentence use а for 'but' instead of но?
Russian has two main words for 'but': а and но. Но is used for a direct contradiction or obstacle. А is used to contrast two different things, much like 'whereas' in English. Since we are contrasting the good coffee with the bad tea, а is the correct choice here.
Since the lesson is about этот, эта, and это, why do both halves of the sentence use этот?