sunny-side up
5
3.2
- adjective
:
huevo frito por un lado
- I can get you some eggs sunny side up.
- sunny-side up egg
- two sunny-side up
- served sunny-side up
Examples
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Three eggs sunny-side up.
Fiction book (2001) -
Sunny-side up or over easy?
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How do you like them sunny side up?
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What do you want, sunny side up or over easy, huh?
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At least we know she likes her eggs sunny-side up.
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Bacon and eggs sunny-side up.
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All right, I'm going to have a side of two eggs, sunny side up, and a side of bacon, crisp.
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I would like to have two eggs, sunny-side up.
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I made them just the way you like them, sunny-side up.
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At least we know she likes her eggs sunny-side up.
How Cooked
Surface Forms
Morphology
sunny-side + up
The meaning is directly describable from the parts: 'sunny' evokes the bright yolk, 'side' indicates one face of the egg, and 'up' signals that this side is facing upward — together transparently describing an egg fried on one side with the yolk visible. This is a literal/descriptive compound rather than an idiom, so a B1 learner who knows the constituent words can readily infer the intended cooking sense.
Etymology
Sunny-side up may come from the image of a fried egg whose bright yellow sunny yolk sits on top like a little sun. Because the egg is cooked on one side so the yolk stays up and visible, the phrase means 'fried on only one side with the yolk left runny and visible on top'.