Lingoflyкафа
- кафаkafacoffee
“кафа” (kafa) — coffee in Serbian. Noun, level A0, topic — food and drink. Feminine — jedna kafa. Domaća kafa is the kind boiled in a small pot, Turkish-style; ordering just kafa gets you exactly that. In a live sentence: “Једна кафа са млеком, молим” (Jedna kafa sa mlekom, molim) — One coffee with milk, please. You can hear how it sounds right here. Written with the characters к, а (a), ф, а (a). One of 188 words in the set “food and drink” in the Serbian course.
In short
| Written in Serbian | кафа (kafa) |
| Read in Latin letters | kafa |
| Translation | coffee |
| Part of speech | noun |
| Level | A0 |
Why it looks that way
Feminine — jedna kafa. Domaća kafa is the kind boiled in a small pot, Turkish-style; ordering just kafa gets you exactly that.
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.
Nearby words: food and drink
A menu, a market, a shop sign, the question “what is this?”. Food is the most frequent subject of the first weeks and the safest excuse to start talking.
- чајčajteaHerbal by default: order čaj in Serbia and you will likely get chamomile or mint. Black tea must be asked for: crni čaj — "black tea".
- водаvodawaterStress on the first syllable. The menu trap: kisela voda is not sour — it is sparkling mineral water.
- хлебhlebbreadIn Croatia the same loaf is kruh. At the bakery specify the color: beli — white, or crni — dark.
- сирsircheeseSpelled and pronounced almost as simply as it looks — one of the friendliest words. Beli sir is the soft white kind.
- месоmesomeatFirst-syllable stress: ME-so. Beef is junetina, pork svinjetina, lamb jagnjetina — the animal plus -etina.
- рибаribafishOn the menu it is always fish. In street talk riba can also mean "a girl" — mildly rude, often heard, never formal.
- салатаsalatasaladSrpska salata is tomatoes and onions; šopska adds white cheese on top. The word also means the lettuce plant itself.
- супаsupasoupA clear broth. A thick, roux-based soup is čorba — on the menu they are two different lines, so order the right one.
- соsosaltOne short syllable and feminine: so, soli. Posoli — "add salt" — is the verb heard at the stove.
- воћеvoćefruitA false friend to guard: it is "fruit", not "vegetables". Vegetables are povrće — the two words even rhyme a little.
Test yourself
Five questions from the same set — “food and drink”. Recalling a spelling from meaning is harder than knowing a familiar word on sight, and therefore more useful.
- How do you say “coffee” in Serbian?
Feminine — jedna kafa. Domaća kafa is the kind boiled in a small pot, Turkish-style; ordering just kafa gets you exactly that.
- How do you say “salad” in Serbian?
Srpska salata is tomatoes and onions; šopska adds white cheese on top. The word also means the lettuce plant itself.
- How do you say “bread” in Serbian?
In Croatia the same loaf is kruh. At the bakery specify the color: beli — white, or crni — dark.
- How do you say “fruit” in Serbian?
A false friend to guard: it is "fruit", not "vegetables". Vegetables are povrće — the two words even rhyme a little.
- How do you say “fish” in Serbian?
On the menu it is always fish. In street talk riba can also mean "a girl" — mildly rude, often heard, never formal.
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 “coffee” in Serbian?
«кафа» (kafa), read “kafa”. In a live sentence: “Једна кафа са млеком, молим” (Jedna kafa sa mlekom, molim) — One coffee with milk, please. You can hear how it sounds right on this page. Noun, level A0, from the set “food and drink”; written with the characters к, а (a), ф, а (a).
How is “кафа” (kafa) written in Latin letters?
kafa. 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?
Feminine — jedna kafa. Domaća kafa is the kind boiled in a small pot, Turkish-style; ordering just kafa gets you exactly that. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
Can I hear how this sounds?
Yes, right on this page: click the word and it will play. The sound works on any phone, and nothing needs to be installed.