🍳 Kitchen - Cocina
Beginner Spanish · Kitchen and cooking
Kitchen and Cooking in Spanish
Kitchen vocabulary becomes much easier to remember when you use it while doing something. Learn a few essential utensils and appliances, then combine them with common cooking actions and practical phrases.
Your next small win: name common kitchen items, ask someone to help while cooking, describe a simple cooking action, and find something in the kitchen.
Start with everyday items
Kitchen Basics
These are useful items for eating, serving, and preparing food.
Plate
Bowl
Spoon
Knife
Fork
Cup
Glass
Ask for something
You need the knife. Ask someone to pass it to you politely.
¿Me pasas el cuchillo, por favor?
Do something with the food
Common Cooking Actions
These verbs let you talk about the steps in a simple recipe or ask someone to help prepare food.
To cook
To cut
To peel
To mix
To boil
To fry
To bake
To serve
Ask someone to help
You want someone to cut the vegetables.
¿Puedes cortar las verduras?
Add the tools you cook with
Cookware and Appliances
A small set of cookware and appliances is enough for many everyday kitchen conversations.
Pot
Frying pan
Cutting board
Oven
Refrigerator
Kitchen sink
Coffee maker
Blender
More kitchen tools and appliances
Spatula
Can opener
Bottle opener
Stove
Microwave
Toaster
Regional Spanish: the source notes that refrigerator vocabulary varies. You may hear refrigerador, nevera, or frigorífico, depending on the region.
Notice the noun and adjective forms
Kitchen Words and Agreement
Kitchen nouns can be masculine or feminine. Articles and changing adjectives should match the noun.
The spoon
The knife
The pot
The oven
The plate is clean.
The cup is clean.
Use Spanish while cooking
Everyday Kitchen Phrases
Can you pass me the knife, please?
The soup is still cooking.
I put the vegetables in the refrigerator.
Dinner is ready. Let's eat!
Useful kitchen situations
Careful, the frying pan is very hot.
I need a spoon to taste the sauce.
The bread has been in the oven for twenty minutes.
I left the dishes in the sink to wash them later.
Preparing dinner
Do you need help with dinner?
Yes, can you cut the vegetables?
Looking for something
Where do you keep the cups?
They're in the cabinet, above the coffee maker.
Give someone a kitchen task
Ask someone to cut the vegetables, then ask them to pass you the knife.
¿Puedes cortar las verduras?
¿Me pasas el cuchillo, por favor?
More kitchen examples
I'm preparing eggs in the frying pan for breakfast.
The coffee maker starts automatically every morning.
We cut the tomatoes on a wooden cutting board.
I made a fruit smoothie with the blender.
Your turn · 8 quick questions
Practice: Kitchen and Cooking
Choose the phrase that fits each situation. Focus on utensils, appliances, cooking actions, requests, and everyday kitchen language.
Practice complete
You can handle basic kitchen and cooking situations.
A few kitchen phrases to revisit
One last step: cook without choices.
Imagine you are preparing dinner with someone. Ask for one kitchen item, give one cooking task, and say when the food is ready.
¿Me pasas el cuchillo, por favor?
¿Puedes cortar las verduras?
La cena está lista. ¡A comer!
You need the knife while cooking. What do you ask?
- ¿Me pasas el cuchillo, por favor?
- ¿Dónde guardas las tazas?
- ¿Necesitas ayuda con la cena?
- La cena está lista.
¿Me pasas el cuchillo, por favor? asks someone to pass you the knife.
¿Me pasas el cuchillo, por favor?
Someone offers to help with dinner. You want them to cut the vegetables. What do you say?
- Sí, ¿puedes cortar las verduras?
- Sí, ¿puedes guardar las tazas?
- Sí, ¿puedes servir el refrigerador?
- Sí, ¿puedes hervir el cuchillo?
Cortar means “to cut,” so cortar las verduras means “to cut the vegetables.”
cortar las verduras = to cut the vegetables
Someone asks where you keep the cups. They are in the cabinet above the coffee maker. Which response fits?
- Están en el armario, encima de la cafetera.
- Están en el horno, debajo de la sartén.
- La cafetera está dentro de las tazas.
- Guardé la cafetera en una taza.
Están agrees with plural tazas, and encima de means “above” or “on top of.”
Están en el armario, encima de la cafetera.
The frying pan is very hot. Which warning fits?
- Cuidado, la sartén está muy caliente.
- La sartén está muy limpia.
- Necesito una taza para la sartén.
- La cena está en la cuchara.
Cuidado is a useful warning, and sartén means frying pan.
Cuidado, la sartén está muy caliente.
Which pair uses the correct articles?
- la cuchara / el cuchillo
- el cuchara / la cuchillo
- la horno / el olla
- el taza / la vaso
The lesson uses la cuchara and el cuchillo.
la cuchara / el cuchillo
You put the vegetables in the refrigerator. Which sentence matches?
- Guardé las verduras en el refrigerador.
- Corté el refrigerador con las verduras.
- Serví el refrigerador en la mesa.
- Mezclé el refrigerador y las verduras.
Guardé las verduras en el refrigerador means “I put the vegetables in the refrigerator.”
Guardé las verduras en el refrigerador.
You left the dishes in the kitchen sink to wash later. Which sentence fits?
- Dejé los platos en el fregadero para lavarlos después.
- Guardé los platos en el horno para freírlos.
- Mezclé los platos con el fregadero.
- Serví el fregadero en los platos.
Fregadero means kitchen sink, and lavarlos refers back to los platos.
Dejé los platos en el fregadero para lavarlos después.
Dinner is ready and you want everyone to start eating. Which phrase fits?
- La cena está lista. ¡A comer!
- La sopa todavía se está cocinando.
- ¿Dónde guardas las tazas?
- Cuidado, la sartén está caliente.
¡A comer! is the expression used here to encourage everyone to start eating.
La cena está lista. ¡A comer!