estufa
stove
Reviewed by: David WestfallCofounder
An appliance that makes heat
Encoding Strategies:
linguistic
visual
e-
extra sound
(eases pronunciation)
+
stove
cooking appliance
+
-a
noun suffix
Estufa means stove and is related to the English word stove1 with an extra sound tacked on the front, the same way Spanish turns "school" into escuela and "Spain" into España.
estufa
stove, range, cooktop
Used for the appliance you cook on in the kitchen. This is the everyday word for it in most of Latin America.
Dejé la sopa en la estufa a fuego lentoI left the soup on the stove over low heat
Mi abuela limpia la estufa después de cocinarMy grandmother cleans the range after cooking
heater, space heater, wood stove
A device whose job is to heat a room. It's a stove with no cooking involved, just the heat. In Spain this is the main meaning, and the kitchen appliance is called a cocina.
Encendí la estufa porque la casa estaba heladaI turned on the heater because the house was freezing
Pusimos una estufa eléctrica en el cuarto de los niñosWe put an electric space heater in the kids' room
criar en estufa
to coddle, to overprotect (colloquial)
Used when someone is raised with so much care that they end up weak. Raising a person in a stove means keeping them in a warm little box where nothing is ever difficult.
A ese niño lo criaron en estufa y ahora no aguanta nadaThey coddled that boy and now he can't handle anything
No críes a tus hijos en estufa, déjalos equivocarseDon't overprotect your kids, let them make mistakes