🥕 Vegetables - Verduras
Beginner Spanish · Vegetables, cooking, and the market
Vegetables in Spanish
Vegetable vocabulary becomes much easier to remember when you use it while cooking or shopping. Learn a compact set of common vegetables, then practice washing, cutting, describing, and buying them.
Your next small win: name common vegetables, describe how you prepare them, ask about price and freshness, and handle a simple market conversation.
Start with everyday vegetables
Common Vegetables
These eight words give you a useful beginner set for cooking and shopping.
Carrot
Potato
Tomato
Lettuce
Onion
Corn
Broccoli
Cucumber
Name three vegetables
Say “carrot, tomato, and onion” in Spanish.
Zanahoria, tomate y cebolla.
More vegetable vocabulary
Bell pepper, depending on regional usage
Garlic
Mushroom
Spinach
Eggplant
Peas
Beans
Salad
Regional vegetable words
Vegetable vocabulary can vary considerably across the Spanish-speaking world.
Regional words for potato
Regional words for peas
Regional words for beans
Do something with the vegetables
Preparing Vegetables
These cooking verbs let you describe the steps of a simple recipe.
To wash
To peel
To cut
To chop
To boil
To fry
To cook
To mix
I'm going to cut the carrots.
I need to chop an onion.
First, the potatoes need to be peeled.
First, I wash and cut the carrots.
I'm going to cook the broccoli for dinner.
Prepare some vegetables
Say that first you wash the carrots, then you cut them.
Primero lavo las zanahorias y después las corto.
Say what the vegetables are like
Describing Vegetables
Taste, texture, freshness, and ripeness help you choose ingredients and describe food.
Fresh
Crunchy
Spicy
Strong
Ripe
Delicious
The salad is fresh and delicious.
I need ripe tomatoes for the sauce.
The cucumber is fresh and crunchy.
The onion has a strong flavor.
Singular, plural, and adjective agreement
I need one onion.
I need three onions.
The tomato is ripe.
The carrots are fresh.
Notice the matches: singular and plural forms change with quantity, and changing adjectives agree with the noun in gender and number.
Describe some carrots
Say that the carrots are fresh.
Las zanahorias están frescas.
Use the vocabulary while shopping
Buying Vegetables at the Market
Quantity, price, freshness, and choosing what to take cover many real market situations.
I would like a kilo of tomatoes, please.
How much are the carrots?
Do you have fresh lettuce?
I need two kilos of potatoes.
I'll take this broccoli.
Give me three onions, please.
Price pattern: plural items use cuestan. For example, ¿Cuánto cuestan las zanahorias?
At the market
How much are the tomatoes?
They cost two euros per kilo.
Making a salad
What do we need for the salad?
We need lettuce, tomato, and cucumber.
Preparing dinner
Can you cut the vegetables?
Yes. I'm going to cut the carrots and the onion.
Shop and cook
Ask the price of the tomatoes, buy three onions, then say that you are going to cut the carrots.
¿Cuánto cuestan los tomates?
Deme tres cebollas, por favor.
Voy a cortar las zanahorias.
More vegetables in context
I use fresh garlic for cooking.
We prepare a salad to go with dinner.
Your turn · 8 quick questions
Practice: Vegetables
Choose the phrase that fits each situation. Focus on vegetable vocabulary, preparation verbs, freshness, agreement, and market language.
Practice complete
You can buy and prepare vegetables in Spanish.
A few vegetable phrases to revisit
One last step: plan a meal without choices.
Choose three vegetables. Say what you need to buy, ask one market question, and explain how you will prepare at least two of the vegetables.
Necesito tomates, zanahorias y una cebolla.
¿Cuánto cuestan los tomates?
Voy a lavar las zanahorias y picar la cebolla.
You want one kilo of tomatoes at the market. What do you say?
- Quisiera un kilo de tomates, por favor.
- Necesito dos kilos de papas.
- Deme tres cebollas, por favor.
- Me llevo este brócoli.
Quisiera un kilo de tomates, por favor is the polite quantity request taught in the lesson.
Quisiera un kilo de tomates, por favor.
You want to know the price of the carrots. What do you ask?
- ¿Cuánto cuestan las zanahorias?
- ¿Tiene lechuga fresca?
- ¿Qué necesitamos para la ensalada?
- ¿Puedes cortar las verduras?
Zanahorias is plural, so the question uses cuestan.
¿Cuánto cuestan las zanahorias?
You are making a salad and need lettuce, tomato, and cucumber. Which response fits?
- Necesitamos lechuga, tomate y pepino.
- Necesitamos zanahorias, cebolla y brócoli.
- Necesitamos papas, ajo y maíz.
- Necesitamos berenjena, espinaca y guisantes.
The lesson's salad conversation uses lechuga, tomate, and pepino.
Necesitamos lechuga, tomate y pepino.
You need to chop an onion into smaller pieces. Which verb fits?
- picar
- pelar
- hervir
- freír
Picar means to chop. Pelar means to peel, hervir means to boil, and freír means to fry.
picar = to chop
The potatoes need to be peeled first. Which sentence matches?
- Primero hay que pelar las papas.
- Primero hay que cortar las zanahorias.
- Primero hay que cocinar el brócoli.
- Primero hay que picar la cebolla.
Pelar means to peel, so the sentence describes peeling the potatoes first.
Primero hay que pelar las papas.
The tomato is ripe and the carrots are fresh. Which pair matches?
- El tomate está maduro. Las zanahorias están frescas.
- El tomate está fresco. Las zanahorias están maduras.
- El tomate está verde. Las zanahorias están crujientes.
- El tomate está picante. Las zanahorias están deliciosas.
Maduro matches the masculine singular tomate. Frescas matches the feminine plural zanahorias.
El tomate está maduro. Las zanahorias están frescas.
Which word is the usual term for potato in Spain?
- patata
- papa
- zanahoria
- pepino
Patata is the usual word for potato in Spain, while papa is widely used in Latin America.
papa / patata = potato
Someone asks you to cut the vegetables. You plan to cut the carrots and the onion. What do you say?
- Sí. Voy a cortar las zanahorias y la cebolla.
- Sí. Voy a pelar las papas.
- Sí. Voy a cocinar el brócoli.
- Sí. Voy a picar el ajo.
The correct response directly answers the request by saying which vegetables you are going to cut.
Sí. Voy a cortar las zanahorias y la cebolla.