cucumber

Everyday

1. A long, thin, green vegetable with a cool, watery inside, eaten raw in salads or sandwiches. tree →
2. The plant it grows on. tree →

In the lessons

In science: cucumbers are fruits in plant science because they have seeds, but we use them as vegetables. In everyday life: cucumber sandwiches, salad. Phrase: as cool as a cucumber (very calm). Pickles (gherkins) are small pickled cucumbers.

Examples

• Slice the cucumber for the salad. tree →
• Cucumbers are mostly water. tree →
• We grew cucumbers in the school garden. tree →
• She stayed as cool as a cucumber in the test. tree →
• Pickles are made from little cucumbers. tree →
• Cucumber sandwiches are popular at tea parties. tree →
• "One is born to that," said the cucumber to itself. tree →

Note

Pronounced KYOO-kum-ber. Countable (a cucumber) or uncountable (some cucumber). In maths problems, «a cucumber cut into slices» can be a division question.

In Jewish tradition

Cucumbers were one of the foods the Israelites remembered from Egypt when they complained in the wilderness. The prophets mention gardens of cucumbers, where a watchman's hut stood or a scarecrow was set up.

Interpretation. The tradition reads the complaint as longing for Egypt's cheap food while forgetting slavery. Some commentators say the "free" food was free only of mitzvot, not of hardship. Isaiah's lonely hut in a cucumber garden is read as a picture of Jerusalem left small and alone after siege.

Examples

• We remember the fish, which we were wont to eat in Egypt for nought; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic; (Torah NUM.11.5, JPS 1917) tree →
• They are like a pillar in a garden of cucumbers, and speak not; they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. (Prophets JER.10.5, JPS 1917) tree →
• And the daughter of Zion is left as a booth in a vineyard, as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city. (Prophets ISA.1.8, JPS 1917) tree →

Note

Pronounced KYOO-kum-ber. Countable (a cucumber) or uncountable (some cucumber). In maths problems, «a cucumber cut into slices» can be a division question.