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伙食 (huǒ shí) — food; meals (especially collectively provided at a school, workplace, or institution)

Definition

伙食 means meals collectively provided to a group — at a school, workplace, or institution — not food in general. Compare 食物 (food generally) and 膳食 (formal, nutrition/diet contexts).

noun
foodmeals (especially collectively provided at a school, workplace, or institution)

Examples

  • 伙食。
    Xué xiào de huǒ shí hěn hǎo.
    The food at school is very good.
  • 伙食。
    Jūn duì de huǒ shí bǐ wǒ men xiǎng xiàng de hǎo de duō.
    The food in the military is much better than we imagined.
  • 伙食。
    Gōng sī zuì jìn jiàng dī le huǒ shí biāo zhǔn.
    The company recently lowered the standard of the meals.

Origin

Compound word
构词法gòucífǎ
偏正piānzhèngModifier + head

The first part narrows down the second: it says what kind of thing the head is.

伙huǒgroup
食shífood

'伙食' joins 伙 and 食, the food or meals of a group.

Characters in this word

Most characters — around four in five — are built this way: one part hints at the meaning, the other at the pronunciation.

This origin belongs to the traditional form 夥; 伙 is its simplified writing.

The simplified 伙 stands for more than one traditional character. In most words (大伙儿, 伙) it is 夥; in others (小伙子) it is 伙.

Meaning part形符xíngfú
多多duō
Sound part声符shēngfú
果
果guǒ夥huǒ
Close in sound todayThe sound part was a clue two thousand years ago — it often still helps, but not always.

The traditional form 夥 combines 多 (many) with 果 as a sound part. The simplified 伙 is a shorthand, so its parts are not the historical parts.

Open 伙 →

Two or more meaningful parts placed together so that their meanings combine into a new one.

  • 亼亼jímouth
  • 皀皀jía bowl of rice on a stand

The form behind 食 shows 亼, a mouth, together with 皀, a bowl of rice on a stand. In modern 食, the bowl part has changed shape.

Open 食 →
Appears in
HSK 3.0 Level 7-9Food (General)

Browse more HSK 7-9 words or search the full 43,000-word dictionary.