liù / liú
verb #51,867

Meanings

  1. 1 to steam (cold food) hot again
  2. 2 to reheat by steaming

Examples

Bǎ shèng de mántou liù yí xià zài chī.
Steam the leftover buns hot again before eating.
Māma gěi wǒ bǎ liángfàn liù rè le.
Mom steamed the cold rice hot for me.

Tips

usage
Everyday kitchen verb in northern China: means to put cold steamed buns or rice back over steam so they go soft and hot again — different from frying or microwaving.

Components

radical
shí
food; eat
Left-side food radical, the running form of . It survives from the cooking sense (re-steaming food); the chemistry meaning 'distill' grew out of that same idea of heating to drive off vapor.
phonetic
liú
to remain; (here) sound
Right side gives the sound liú and is itself the phonetic in a family of liú characters such as and .

Stroke Order

liù