leftovers
part of speech
noun (leftovers — plural); adjective (leftover)
meaning for a pupil
1) Leftovers are food that is not eaten at a meal and is kept to eat later. tree →
2) Leftover means remaining after the rest has been used. tree →
sense in the lessons
In everyday life families keep leftovers in the fridge and eat them the next day; in food safety lessons leftovers must be cooled quickly, covered, kept cold and eaten within a day or two, and reheated until piping hot. In maths «leftover» is what remains, like a remainder in division. In lessons on waste, using leftovers saves food. Phrases: eat the leftovers, leftover pizza, leftover paint, leftover money.
examples
- We had leftovers for dinner. tree →
- Put the leftovers in the fridge. tree →
- Leftover turkey makes good sandwiches. tree →
- Use the leftover paper for another project. tree →
- Don't eat leftovers that smell bad. tree →
- Cool leftovers before you put them in the fridge. tree →
- 17 sweets shared among 5: each gets 3, with 2 left over. tree →
note
The noun is almost always plural: «leftovers». The adjective is one word: «leftover rice». The verb phrase is two words: «there were 2 left over». In division word problems the leftover is the remainder: 17 ÷ 5 = 3 remainder 2.
In the corpora
- Bread fills ducks with little goodness and rotting leftovers dirty the pond; oats, peas, sweetcorn or duck food are better.
- In many countries it is against the law to feed pigs kitchen leftovers, because meat scraps can spread serious pig diseases.
- Fish should get only as much food as they eat in a couple of minutes, because leftovers rot and poison the water.
- Before stacking plates, scrape the leftovers into the bin or the food caddy, a small bin just for food scraps.
- That is why pets get their own food, not leftovers from your plate.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «leftovers» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.