If you need something else, use Can I have…? or Could I have….?

Can I have the menu, please?

Can I have more potatoes, please?

Can I have some more bread, please?

Can I have another spoon, please?

Could we have…? is even more polite.

Could we have a table outside?

Could I have some water, please?

Could I have the bill, please?

To ask someone to do something for you, use Can you…? or Could you…?

Can you close the window, please?

Can you bring us some more water, please?

Please can you pass the salt?

Could you bring us our coffee, please?

Please can you take our plates away?

Could you bring us our desserts, please?

Saying what you like, dislike or prefer

To talk about foods that you like, use I like… To ask if someone likes something, use Do you like…?

I like mushrooms.

Do you like fish?

I don’t like carrots.

I like spicy Indian food.

Do you like Chinese food?

If you like something very much, use I really like… or I love…

I really like ice-cream.

I love seafood.

If you do not like something, say I don’t like…

I don’t like sweets.

To ask if somebody do not like something, ask Don’t you like…?

Don’t you like corn soup?

Don’t you like ice-cream?

To say that you like one food more than another food, use prefer.

I prefer fish to meat.

Note that in this structure, the thing that we like more goes before to and the thing that we like less goes after to.

I prefer home-cooked food to any restaurant food. (= I like home-cooked food more than restaurant food.)