Uncountable English Nouns to Count Drinks - Basic English Grammar

hi everybody my name is Alisha today I'm

going to talk about some counter words that we can use for explaining drinks so

if you've seen some of the other videos we've done in this whiteboard series you

may have seen some information about countable and uncountable nouns so

uncountable nouns are nouns that we cannot count with simply 1 2 or 3 in

front of the noun instead we have to use what are called counter words to explain

the quantity so these are some words that we can use to talk about drinks

specifically before we begin though I want to mention that the an easy hint

for counting drinks is to remember that we often count drinks according to the

item the container they are sold in or the container they are served in so this

can help make it really really easy to choose your counter word when you're

thinking about drinks also you'll notice that each one of these counter words is

followed by the word of so for example mug of something will be our first one

so remember to use your number before the counter word next comes the counter

word then of and finally your now the item you're counting so let's take a

look at a few ways that we can count liquids and drinks okay so as I said

let's begin the first word is mug mug so mug has this sort of image we use a mug

primarily for coffee and tea so something that we typically have hot

drinks in is a mug a mug of coffee a mug of tea we use mug for items that have

this shape it's kind of a tall shape usually a bit thick and it has this

handle perhaps there are different shapes of mug but they generally they

can hold heat quite well a mug of coffee a mug of tea the next one is glass so a

glass of water a glass of juice a glass of wine these are just simple simple

glasses as you can see the word glasses here but the container it doesn't have

to be made of glass it's just a glass is the

word that we use to talk about the serving size keep in mind a glass of

wine means one serving of wine only so you might have a special wine glass to

drink a glass of wine from so wine in this case is referring only to a single

serving so please be careful there so glass is another word we can use for one

serving of something the next word is bottle so we can say a bottle of beer

like a it's it's made of glass yes but we use bottle to describe it a bottle of

beer a bottle of wine a bottle of water a bottle of tea a bottle of Cola or soda

any drink which is sold in a bottle shape a bottle container we can use

bottle for please remember however that bottle of wine and glass of wine are

quite different a glass of wine is a single serving of wine a bottle of wine

is a large large quantity a large amount of wine so a bottle of wine has many

servings a glass of wine is one serving in theory okay next is can-can so we can

have a can of coffee a can of tea a can of soda a can of cola a can of beer by

the way the difference between soda and cola it really depends on the place

you're in depending on the place in the US or the place in any other

english-speaking country really there might be a preferred way of saying Cola

or soda or even pop so just keep in mind that many people use different words to

mean the same thing it depends on region so soda and cola this is an example of

this so we use can if it is sold in a can we can use can to describe it so any

of these items or maybe there's a different item in your country sold in a

can but we can use can of to talk about these nouns next one is Cup Cup so we

usually use cup with coffee and tea so this is a little bit different from mug

so a cup maybe look something like this a mug maybe look something a little bit

more like this they're very very similar mug kind of has the image of something

warm something a bit thick and heavy cup has sort of a feeling of a little bit

lighter maybe it doesn't have to be hot mug kind of you imagine that it's going

to be a warm drink or a hot drink cup not necessarily so so we can use cup for

tea or coffee as well okay let's go to the next group

next is drop the word drop we can use drop to count liquid but just a little

bit of something so for example we use drop to count rain so rain drops drops

of rain we could use it for water like drops of water on my iPhone screen or

something we could say drops of wine got on my sweater for example so drops means

a few pieces of water but we cannot use pieces for a liquid instead we use a

drop so please use drop to refer to the small parts of liquid drops of something

drops of liquid okay next one is sip sip is interesting

sip refers to a small taste of liquid so if you want to try a drink you can say

for example can I have a sip of tea can I have a sip of your wine means just a

small taste a small taste of something is a sip a sip of something so we can

use a sip of water like I need a sip of water or can I have a sip of tea or she

took a big sip of beer we could say a big sip if we want to kind of make an

interesting phrase so a sip yes but a big one maybe sounds like a mouthful

instead of just a small quantity so usually sip means just a small quantity

okay next one is carton carton so I've used milk here as the primary example

but anything sold in this sort of cardboard shape that we have to open and

pour from we can use the word carton to describe so a carton of milk in your

country or in your city there might be a different item that is sold in cartons

you can use carton to talk about that to count it one carton of milk two cartons

of another one that drinks are commonly

sold in is jug jug so we can say a jug of milk sorry a jug of milk a jug of

juice the difference between a carton and a jug is that a jug is usually made

of plastic and it has a handle on the side so a jug of something is different

from a carton a carton is usually made of cardboard or some kind of paper

material and it does not have a handle on it okay finally is keg keg keg is

something typically we do not buy ourselves in stores but we can see at

bars or restaurants maybe so a keg is used to count beer keg is used to count

beer it's as very large often very large though sometimes there may be smaller

kegs there are these storage containers for fresh beer so you might see beer

being served from a tap the tap is connected to a keg so we can say one keg

or two kegs of beer or let's preserve a keg of beer for our party next weekend

so this is a word we typically use only for beer okay so those are a few counter

words that are commonly used to talk about drinks and maybe other liquids too

if you have any questions or comments or if there's another counter words you

know please feel free to let us know in the comments I hope that this video was

useful for you please give it a thumbs up if you liked it check us out at

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if you haven't already thanks very much for watching this episode and I will see

you again soon

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