Question 1

Why do we need the preposition за before сорок минут?

Accepted Answer

We use за because the verb испёк is perfective, meaning the action was fully completed with a result. When you want to express how much time it took to complete something (in forty minutes), you use за followed by the accusative case. If he had just spent forty minutes baking without focusing on the finished result, we would use the imperfective verb пёк and drop the preposition (using just the bare accusative for duration).

Question 2

What is the infinitive of испёк and why does it look so different?

Accepted Answer

The infinitive is испечь (to bake). Verbs ending in -чь often have unusual past tense forms because they drop the ending. For a masculine subject like Ivan, it becomes испёк. If a woman had baked the pie, the feminine past tense would be испекла.

Question 3

Why is the word for minutes in the form минут instead of минуты?

Accepted Answer

After the number сорок (forty), the noun must be in the genitive plural case. The genitive plural of минута is минут. Even though the preposition за requires the accusative case, which affects the number (сорок looks the same in both nominative and accusative), the number itself still forces the noun following it into the genitive plural.

Question 4

Is пирог in the nominative or accusative case here?

Accepted Answer

It is in the accusative case because it is the direct object of the verb (the thing Ivan baked). However, because пирог (pie) is a masculine inanimate noun, its accusative form is identical to its dictionary (nominative) form.

Иван испёк пирог за сорок минут.

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