"Io mangio il gelato al cioccolato."
Translation:I eat the chocolate ice cream.
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is the "al" necessary here? Could it not be "io mangio il gelato ciccolato"?
No, it couldn't. You'll find more detailed explanations down the road (the topic came up quite often), but to sum up, cioccolato isn't an adjective, and in Romance languages you can't usually put two nouns together without some preposition; in Italian you have the choice of "di" (made of), "con" (with the addition of), and "a" (flavored). In this case "al cioccolato" means "chocolate-flavored"; this construct seems to have been borrowed from French (au chocolat) a couple of centuries ago.
it doesn't have any proper translation in English, but it can't be. It's like you saying a name followed by a name, instead of a name followed by an adjective
1773
So if I were to eat strawberry ice cream, it would read, "Io mangio il gelato alla fragola," yes? I assume that all flavours would be written like that?
I remember I mentioned to an Italian friend about an ice cream called "gelato ice cream" in my country and he laughed. Now I get it, because for Italians, it means "ice cream ice cream" to them. But for non-Italian speakers, gelato is a different thing.
Kind of like how Ferrari caused confusion with their special collectors model LaFerrari. Ferrari LaFerrari....meaning "The Ferrari The Ferrari". Or as we usually talk about it in English...the LaFerrari, meaning "the The Ferrari"
RAS syndrome.
Which stands for redundant acronym syndrome... syndrome?
I just think we as Americans are stupid hahah cause I know what you mean with gelato being a type of ice cream
Why is it that sometimes the "the" is translated into English, and sometimes not? For this sentence it reads "I eat the ice cream," but on other examples it will say something like "Io bevo l'acqua" but the translation will just be "I drink water" not "I drink THE water." Very confused.
Now I get it! The word al is used to link the words gelato and cioccolato together. Together "gelato al cioccolato" means chocolate ice cream. I was confused before because "al" means "for" or "to" in other situations.
In English you would normally say "I eat chocolate ice cream" and not "I eat THE chocolate ice cream" unless it's a specific one, but that's normally less likely. Otherwise it sounds really stupid
"I eat the ice cream with chocolate" Is it also wrong in English ?just wonder^^
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Yes it is wrong in English, because "I eat ice cream WITH chocolate" means that you are eating ice cream AND something else (in this case, chocolate). If you said this, a native English speaker would think you meant ice cream with chocolate sauce, or chocolate candy, etc. The word "chocolate" can be used as an adjective (a word that describes a noun), but it is also a noun itself. So you have to be careful how you use it.
It implies that you've added chocolate to the ice cream, or that you're eating them together
I got marked wrong for typing i eat a chocolate ice cream, isn't that a correct response as well?
"il" = "the". Your version would be "Io mangio un gelato al cioccolato. Ciao e buona fortuna.
My answer to this question was: "I 'have' the chocolate ice cream." in stead of "I 'eat' the chocolate ice cream." Duo said this is wrong: why is it? In English you can say "to have ice cream", just as you can say "to have dinner", can't you? In other situations, a translation with 'to have' (such as: Pranzano - I 'have' lunch) is approved? Why not in this situation?
How can pronounce the "il" after "mangio"? It sounds like that the two words have blended into one.
The "il" does get swallowed a bit, by this (computer?) speaker. It's clearer in the slow version of course. Minor articles, prepositions, etc. get swallowed (elided) in any language. There's a really strong one further on in this course - "In realtà lui è un buon tipo". The n is completely elided, it comes over as "Irrealta", fast or slow. I checked it extensively on other pronunciation sites, and it turns out that that combo, ie. "in + r---" is routinely elided to "ir---", at least in standard phrases like "in realita". There would be dozens of similar things in English, can't think of one right now. Hope that helps, ciao.
In Spanish we can say icecream of cream, icecream of water, icecream* of milk, icecream of yogurt.... and also icecream of any flavor.... "Nieve de chocolate" in this case.
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No, it couldn't. You'll find more detailed explanations down the road (the topic came up quite often), but to sum up, cioccolato isn't an adjective, and in Romance languages you can't usually put two nouns together without some preposition; in Italian you have the choice of "di" (made of), "con" (with the addition of), and "a" (flavored). In this case "al cioccolato" means "chocolate-flavored"; this construct seems to have been borrowed from French (au chocolat) a couple of centuries ago.
(Copied from the MOD, f.formica) https://www.duolingo.com/f.formica
I answered "I am eating the chocolate gelato." This was marked wrong not for the gelato (I guess they changed that), but for the "am eating" instead of "eat." Why?
