When you "grind" something, it means you rub two hard things against each other until they start to rub parts of each other off. This word is most often used to talk about preparing food. Things that people often "grind" include:

pepper

coffee beans

wheat or corn (to make flour or corn meal)

the gears on a car (when someone doesn't know how to drive a stick shift well)

The adjective (and past tense) form of "grind" is "ground", so you will often hear people talk about powders such as:

ground pepper

ground coffee

Some processes that are similar to "grinding" but have different names are:

• "Chopping" something means cutting it into small pieces with a knife.
• You can "blend" something like a milkshake or smoothie in a blender, which is a machine that uses a fast-spinning blade.
• "Grating" food means taking small pieces off of the outside by rubbing it with a tool that has lots of sharp holes in it. You "grate" things like cheese and carrots.
• You can "smash" something by pressing on it really hard until it loses its shape.