Zapp! English Colloquial 3.26 - Cooking & Recipes
Taught by Katie Wood — Cambridge CELTA · Cambridge DELTA · Cambridge-accredited Teacher Trainer
Recorded and taught by a team of British and North American English teachers, based in Oxford (UK) and Barcelona (Spain).
Katie opens this one with a confession: "This is a very hungry Katie, sitting in Tom's apartment, talking to Amanda." Amanda replies in kind, then adds that she'll be listening "Amidst the sound of my stomach rumbling." That's the setup for the whole recording — one speaker describing colloquial expressions about food and eating, the other guessing them, both of them getting hungrier as they go. By the end they've stopped teaching and started complaining.
What you'll hear in this episode
Katie describes ten colloquial expressions without saying them, and Amanda works them out from clues. It's the fastest way to hear how these phrases really behave, because Amanda doesn't just name them — she explains them in her own words.
They start with hunger. Amanda gets starving immediately, then unpicks what it literally means: "there's a famine, you have nothing to eat, and you're on the verge of dying". Katie asks how often we actually mean that. "We're not ever starving," Amanda admits — it's pure exaggeration.
The horse expression produces the best moment in the episode. One of the speakers points out that she'd still say she could eat a horse despite being vegetarian, because "there's not really a vegetable big enough to convey it, is there?" Amanda's attempt at a substitute — "I could eat a whole carrot!" — does not work.
Then peckish, which Amanda cracks by noticing "it's the same verb that's used for birds when they eat seeds". Then the full end of the scale: stuffed, I couldn't eat another thing as the polite version when a host offers you more, and Katie's bonus line, "Stick a fork in me I'm done."
The second half moves to grub, calling people to the table with "Grub's up!", making your mouth water, and two expressions that use food but aren't about eating: having your cake and eating it (Amanda's example is wanting a higher salary without the stress) and making a dog's dinner of something — the one Amanda genuinely can't get until she hears it.
Quick facts
| Episode | 3.26 — Cooking & Recipes |
| Series | Colloquial 3 |
| Level | 3 |
| Length | 14 minutes 11 seconds |
| Speakers | Katie and Amanda |
| Workbook | Included in the all-in-one pack (€39) |
What you'll learn
The useful thing here isn't the list of phrases — it's hearing where each one sits on a scale. Katie states it plainly: "peckish is in the middle, starving is very strong, and I could eat a horse is very strong, in...the hungry direction." Learners often collect idioms without knowing the strength of them, and then say they're starving when they mean they fancy a biscuit.
You'll also hear how guessing works in real speech. Katie leaves sentences unfinished — "oh that smell is making..." — and Amanda completes them. That's a genuine conversational habit, and following it trains you to predict what's coming rather than translating word by word.
There's honest hesitation too. When the dog's dinner clue lands, Amanda says "I don't know at the moment, I am thinking..." and Katie offers "You might know it when you hear it". Listening to a native speaker not know something is more useful than listening to a perfect performance.
The two scripted teaching sections then check meaning and pronunciation, with pauses for you to repeat after the beep and short example sentences like "He made a right dog's dinner of it" and "He's making a pig of himself, he's going to be sick."
The expressions, as the workbook defines them
The glossary marks each expression 1, 2 or 3 for how informal it is — 3 meaning "Don't use this with your mother-in-law!!!"
- I'm starving (1) – very hungry. The one Amanda guesses first.
- I could eat a horse (1) – very hungry. Survives even a vegetarian's objections.
- I'm peckish (1) – a little bit hungry. Amanda links it to the wine-o'clock stage of the evening.
- I'm stuffed (1) – completely full.
- I couldn't eat another thing (1) – completely full. The polite refusal at someone's house.
- grub (1) – food. As in "Grub's up!"
- to make your mouth water (1) – for food, or a description of food, to smell, taste or sound so good that your mouth literally creates water.
- to have your cake and eat it (1) – to have two things at the same time which are impossible or opposite.
- to make a dog's dinner of something (1) – to do something wrong or badly, to make a mess of something.
- to make a pig of yourself (2) – to be greedy, to eat too much. Amanda's verdict: "You literally change into one."
What's in the workbook
The PDF for this unit contains the full transcript of both conversation tasks, so you can read exactly how Amanda arrives at each answer, plus the scripts of both Meaning and Pronunciation sections. The glossary lists all ten expressions with definitions and the 1–3 informality rating, so you know which ones are safe in most company and which need a friendly audience.
There are then two practice exercises. Exercise 1 gives you six plain sentences to rewrite using the new expressions — "Stop being so greedy", "I'm not that hungry but I could eat a snack", and so on. Exercise 2 is a matching task: you join five sentence openings to five endings, including "I've made a right dog's dinner of this painting" with "it looks nothing like you." Full answers are supplied, with alternatives noted where more than one expression fits.
This workbook comes with the all-in-one pack, which covers every episode we've made for €39.
Get the complete courseAll workbooks and audio — €39
Common questions
Is the conversation scripted?
No. Katie and Amanda are working through the expressions live, which is why there are false starts and a stretch where Amanda simply can't recall one. The teaching sections that set up the tasks and give the answers are scripted, so the instructions stay clear.
Do I need the workbook to follow the audio?
No — the audio is free and works on its own. The workbook helps if you want the transcript in front of you or want to test yourself afterwards.
Which of these can I use at work?
All ten are informal. Nine are rated 1, meaning most situations and most people; "to make a pig of yourself" is rated 2 and is best kept for people you know well.
What if I can't guess the answers?
That's fine — Amanda doesn't get all of them straight away either. Listen once for the clues, then again with the transcript.
How long is the episode?
14 minutes 11 seconds, including both pronunciation sections.
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