Ask Lemmy

When it comes to refried beans, “too many” or “too much” are both incorrect. The correct construction is “may I have some more please?”

Since the word "beans" is plural, and countable, it's "many".

"Many" is for things that are countable, "much" is for things that aren't. e.g. Water - you'd say "too much water" but you wouldn't say "too much cups of water" but "too many cups of water".

Though "refried beans" is a thing on its own, I could go either way. Like if you were spooning beans onto my plate, I may say "too much!".

How's that for a confident, clear answer? 😆

It depends on whether you're referring to individual refried beans or the dish 'refried beans' as a whole.

If it's the former, it would be 'too many' (individual) refried beans.

If it is the latter, it would be 'too much' (of) refried beans... Unless you had multiple servings, in which case it would be 'too many' (servings of) refried beans.

That is my opinion: as such it is subject to change should further information come to light.

Because refried beans are as you mention no longer countable, I think "refried beans" should be taken all together as a singular compound noun rather than the word "beans" modified by an adjective. So then "too much refried beans" is the correct way to say it because it isn't plural.

It seems like the problem goes away if you add a "the." I had too much of the refried beans.

I think you’re just going to have to call it “too much refried bean paste”

I've eaten too many corn.

I think it depends on if you view beans as individual beans or not.

Obviously this is very context dependant, but here's my take:

"I ate too many refried beans" = in one meal, I consumed more refried beans than I should have

"I ate too much refried beans" = over the course of an extended period of time, I ate meals consisting of refried beans more frequently than I should have

Same question, but mashed potatoes.

Since refried beans is not countable, I vote for "too much".

Example:

• I'm gassy because I had too much refried beans
• I am gassy because I had too many burritos

Or like someone else suggested, make the noun singular and call them "refried bean paste". This will probably raise more eyebrows than much/many confusion, though.

No such thing. You can never have enough.

Mmmmmmm.... Beans

I would say 'too much'; I never talk about a single refried bean (throwing out the whole thing that refritos aren't necessarily even fried twice...)

"Excess beanage."

You would use too much, since refried beans is an uncountable noun. You have to add a unit to it to make it countable.

You would say "there's too much refried beans on my plate, and too many cans of refried beans in the pantry."

By adding "cans" to the noun phrase, you've made the refried beans countable, you may now use "too many."

"Scrambled eggs" is kind of similar. You could say, "I had too many scrambled eggs" or, "I had too much scrambled egg."

So I think the correct version is:

"I had too much refried bean."

I believe the customary phrase is "pull my finger."

Depends whether you consider the noun countable or not. Too many peas, too much mashed potato. It's purely semantics, I think we can consider refried beans an edge case.

Whichever sounds more natural to you, because the whole countable/non-countable less/fewer is crap made up by Edwardian snobs and then repeated by school teacher gammarians too into being "proper". To quote wiki

The comparative less is used with both countable and uncountable nouns in some informal discourse environments and in most dialects of English.[citation needed] In other informal discourse however, the use of fewer could be considered natural. Many supermarket checkout line signs, for instance, will read "10 items or less"; others, however, will use fewer in an attempt to conform to prescriptive grammar. Descriptive grammarians consider this to be a case of hypercorrection as explained in Pocket Fowler's Modern English Usage.[7][8] A British supermarket chain replaced its "10 items or less" notices at checkouts with "up to 10 items" to avoid the issue.[9][10] It has also been noted that it is less common to favour "At fewest ten items" over "At least ten items" – a potential inconsistency in the "rule",[11] and a study of online usage seems to suggest that the distinction may, in fact, be semantic rather than grammatical.[8] Likewise, it would be very unusual to hear the unidiomatic "I have seen that film at fewest ten times."[12][failed verification]

The Cambridge Guide to English Usage notes that the "pressure to substitute fewer for less seems to have developed out of all proportion to the ambiguity it may provide in noun phrases like less promising results". It describes conformance with this pressure as a shibboleth and the choice "between the more formal fewer and the more spontaneous less" as a stylistic choice.[13]