to spring for dinner
1
7.2
- phrasal verb
- Informal
:
invitar a cenar
- Whenever we have visitors, my parents usually spring for dinner at a nice place.
Examples
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It was my birthday, so my friends offered to spring for dinner as a treat.
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I'll spring for dinner tonight!
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I decided to spring for dinner at that fancy new Italian restaurant.
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He always springs for dinner when we go out.
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To celebrate their success, Jake decided to spring for dinner at the new Italian restaurant.
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After a long week, Sarah was happy to spring for dinner and treat her friends to their favorite sushi place.
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For their anniversary, Mark promised to spring for dinner and take his partner to a fancy restaurant in town.
Synonyms
29
5.3
To pay for something, often when it is expensive or unexpected
How Generous
Surface Forms
Morphology
The sense 'to pay for (as a treat)' comes from the idiomatic phrasal verb 'spring for', which is not a transparent extension of the literal sense of 'spring' (to jump or appear suddenly). A B1 learner who only knows the constituent meanings 'spring', 'for', and 'dinner' would not reliably infer the paying/treat sense, and this usage is language-specific rather than compositionally predictable.
Etymology
Spring for dinner comes from the image of spring, to jump out or quickly give something. One popular story says people would 'spring' money out of their pocket to pay a bill, so spring for dinner means 'to pay for dinner', often as a 'treat'.