The English Breakfast ☕
Hi there,
Welcome back to The English Breakfast — the newsletter for Italian professionals who want to sound more confident and natural in English at work.
I hope you’ve had a great week. A lot of my business courses have finished now, so I’ll finally have time to start some Christmas shopping next week! Leaving it a bit last minute I know 😅
All right, let’s get started with a very common mistake that even advanced speakers make in English.
Curious to know what it is?
Watch this week’s video to find out — and learn how to avoid making the mistake when you speak.
Here’s a recap of what you heard in the video:
✔️ Use “important” when something has value, meaning, or consequence.
It’s about significance, not size or quantity.
Correct uses of “important”
“This is an important meeting.” → It matters.
“It’s an important decision.” → It has serious consequences.
“She plays an important role in the company.”
“It’s important to be on time.” → Being on time has value.
👉 Key idea:
Important = meaningful, significant, influential.
❌ Don’t use “important” to talk about size, quantity, or intensity.
In Italian, importante can mean big, heavy, a lot, significant in size.
But in English, important does NOT describe physical size or quantity.
Incorrect uses of “important“ (common Italian mistakes)
“It was an important meal.” ❌
“An important amount of money.” ❌
“An important number of emails.” ❌
“An important meeting” → correct ONLY if you mean meaningful, not simply long or difficult.
✔️ What to say instead
🍝 Instead of “important meal”:
a big meal
a heavy meal
a rich meal
a substantial meal (more formal)
💶 Instead of “important amount of money”:
a lot of money
a large amount of money
a significant amount of money (neutral/formal)
a considerable amount of money (formal)
📧 Instead of “an important number of emails”:
a lot of emails
many emails
a large number of emails
Let’s check your understanding
Do the quiz to see if you’ve understood. Can these 8 sentences be translated using the word important or not?
Let’s listen
No edition of The English Breakfast would be complete without a good cup of something hot. And if coffee is your cup of tea (= something you usually like or enjoy), then this is for you.
Watch the video and decide whether the following sentences are true or false.
👀 Answers are at the bottom of this email.
Coffee was first consumed by sheep.
People began foraging (= searching for and gathering) for coffee in Ethiopia.
The Ottoman Empire introduced coffee to Europe.
By 1906 Ethiopia was exporting 80% of the world’s coffee.
Scientists are trying to produce a resistant form of coffee.
If you want to finally understand native speakers when you talk to them — or follow films and TV series without subtitles — then this course is for you. Check out the offer below and help me buy some Christmas presents 🤣
€120 ➡ €72
40% discount with the coupon code “REALENGLISH”
You'll also receive:
A free copy of my e-book "What did you say?" to learn 99 phrases that native speakers use (worth €9.99).
1 month of free conversation sessions with The English Fluency Club (worth €50).
👀 Here are the answers
Coffee was first consumed by sheep. False - goats
People began foraging (= searching for and gathering) for coffee in Ethiopia. True
The Ottoman Empire introduced coffee to Europe. True
By 1906 Ethiopia was exporting 80% of the world’s coffee. False - Brazil
Scientists are trying to produce a resistant form of coffee. True
All right, that’s it for today. I hope you enjoyed today’s edition. Reply to this email and let me know 📧
😀 It was great!
🙂 It was OK.
❌ There was nothing useful for me.
Have a great week and see you next time.
Dan
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