“Too many” kinda sounds right to my ear because beans is plural, but the second logically seems right because its served by volume and is not ‘countable’ as ordinary (non-destroyed) beans might be.
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? 😆
Try to count a can of refried beans and get back to me with a result.
One can.
Done.
Lol, I know, right?
On my plate it’s a volumetric thing, so a single unit.
But it is “beans” (plural) in a can.
So you’d normally say “that’s too much!” in which case the subject “that” is plural and countable so therefore “much” would be correct.
Otherwise you should say “you have given me too many refried beans!” since the beans are volumetric and not countable entities.
Well clarified!
TI®L. Today I Re-Learned.
Thanks for this. I have basic English knowledge and this helps me
Lol, I like the new acronym
I wouldn’t consider beans countable, and would put it in the same category as rice or noodles. So I’d say “too much” is the correct term.
One noodle/ a bowl of noodles. Or one bean, a bowl of beans.
But you wouldn’t say: one rice. You’d say one grain of rice. So it’s like rice is automatically a mass of many individual bits/grains of rice. Beans are not that way, they’re countable.
Not after they’ve been refried.
Consider a potato and mashed potatoes.
Yes. There are countable and non-countable nouns and thems the rules.
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.
“Too many” if you’re referring to the beans themselves. “Too much” if you’re referring to refried beans as a dish you have been served.
Edit: just remember: “too many” as reference to a quantity of things, “too much” as reference to a volume or a quantity/amount of a thing. In this case, the “thing” was the dish being served (refried beans). Since it was the dish, itself, being considered (not each individual bean) the phrase was being dealt with, grammatically, as one whole unit— a dish that was served to you, of which you had too much.
It seems like the problem goes away if you add a “the.” I had too much of the refried beans.
Your point is fair, but I respectfully disagree. “Beans” being plural makes me want to use “many.” “I had too many of the refried beans” parses fine for me.
Counter question:
Would you also use “many” for mashed potatoes, since potatoes is plural?
I don’t think I’ve ever been asked to quantify mashed potatoes in such a way, but after reflecting for a moment, yes. Thank you for an interesting question.
I’ve eaten too many corn.
Corn(s)
I think you’re just going to have to call it “too much refried bean paste”
I think it depends on if you view beans as individual beans or not.
“Excess beanage.”
NGL… I kinda want to tell someone to reduce their beanage without any context, and walk away.
Same question, but mashed potatoes.
I would think that would be “too much” because all the potatoes don’t matter at that point, it’s one entity. There are no more individual potatoes, we are
Borgmashed potatoes!
No such thing. You can never have enough.
Mmmmmmm… Beans
“Too many refried beans”
“Too much refried bean”Same for scrambled eggs.
“Too many scrambled eggs”
“Too much scrambled egg”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.
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.
