A cat's paw for cutting vegetables with 野菜を切る
Vocabulary Explanation: Collocations for cooking
Hinata’s second-grade class is on an overnight school trip, and each team is cooking curry. Touma has bet that their team will beat Chiharu’s, though he has never made curry before. He has started peeling the potatoes, and Midori now has a knife in hand to start cutting.
- ひなた:
- 「野菜切る時は猫の手だっぺ」
- “When you cut vegetables, make a cat's paw.”
- Literal: “When cutting vegetables, it's a cat's hand.”
- 美鳥:
- 「ね… ねこの手？」
- “A c... a cat's paw?”
Key Points
1野菜(を)切る = to cut vegetables
- 切る is the general verb for cutting, and 野菜を切る is the ordinary way to talk about chopping vegetables.
- In casual speech the を drops out, as it does here: 野菜切る.
2猫の手 = cat’s paw grip
- 猫の手 is the knife-safety grip taught in Japanese schools and cooking classes. You tuck your fingertips under so the knuckles face the blade, like a cat’s curled paw. Hinata shows it with her raised fist.
- Japanese uses 手 for an animal’s front paws too, so 猫の手 is literally “a cat’s hand”.
- Don’t confuse it with the idiom 猫の手も借りたい, “so busy I’d even borrow a cat’s paws”.
3〜時は = when ~
- Plain verb + 時 means “when” doing something. 野菜切る時 is “when you cut vegetables”.
- は makes that situation the topic, so the line works as a general rule: “whenever you’re cutting vegetables, it’s cat paws.”
4だっぺ = Hinata’s dialect copula
- Hinata lived her first life as an old woman from the countryside, and she speaks a rural dialect of the northern Kanto region. 〜っぺ is one of its best-known endings.
- Here だっぺ works like だよ, stating the rule firmly. In standard Japanese she might say 猫の手だよ or 猫の手にするんだよ.
Vocabulary
野菜 (Vegetables)
野菜 is the general word for plants grown to be eaten, such as cabbage, carrots, and onions.
切る (To cut)
切る is to cut something. It also means to end a phone call or turn something off.
時 (Time)
時 is a point or stretch of time. 〜時 means “when” or “at the time of”.
猫 (Cat)
猫 is the small furry animal kept as a house pet. A person who prefers them to dogs is a 猫派.
手 (Hand)
手 is a hand. It also means a way or means, or help from someone.
See Also
- Vocabulary: Collocations for cooking
- Kanji: Hands and skill with 手
- Kanji: Time and occasions with 時
老女的少女ひなたちゃん © its respective creators. It is used here for educational commentary.