שמן לבישול
“שמן לבישול” (шамэн ле-бишуль) — cooking oil in Hebrew. Noun, level A1. The shemen is the oil, but the same letters read shamen — fat — which you know; so the course takes oil for cooking. In a live sentence: “במטבח יש שמן לבישול.” — There is cooking oil in the kitchen. Written with the characters ש, מ, ל, ב, י, ש, ו, ל. A word from the everyday Hebrew course, level A1.
In short
| Written in Hebrew | שמן לבישול |
| Read in Latin letters | шамэн ле-бишуль |
| Translation | cooking oil |
| Part of speech | noun |
| Level | A1 |
Why it looks that way
The shemen is the oil, but the same letters read shamen — fat — which you know; so the course takes oil for cooking
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- במטבח יש שמן לבישול.бе-митбах йеш шамэн ле-бишуль.There is cooking oil in the kitchen.
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “cooking oil” in Hebrew?
«שמן לבישול», read “шамэн ле-бишуль”. In a live sentence: “במטבח יש שמן לבישול.” — There is cooking oil in the kitchen. Noun, level A1; written with the characters ש, מ, ל, ב, י, ש, ו, ל.
How is “שמן לבישול” written in Latin letters?
шамэн ле-бишуль. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
The shemen is the oil, but the same letters read shamen — fat — which you know; so the course takes oil for cooking. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.