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You have a bowl of hot soup / a stick of cold ice cream.

How do you express that you want to cool it off / warm it up by sending air from your mouth to it?

Is it accurate to say

  1. "to blow the soup to cool it off" OR "to blow at the soup to cool it off"

  2. "to blow the ice cream to warm it up" OR "to blow at the ice cream to warm it up"

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  • 1
    I use "blow on it". Commented Jun 15, 2020 at 12:13
  • For (hard, scooped) ice cream you would 'let it stand' or "allow it to stand' to give it some time to soften (or thaw). Commented Jun 15, 2020 at 12:23
  • @BruceMurray, the air from our mouth is warm and thus help to warm the ice cream up. Can I say "to blow on the ice cream"?
    – Tom
    Commented Jun 15, 2020 at 13:37
  • Yes, but I have never encountered this behaviour with ice cream. For me, it's bizarre, but I live in Brazil and ice cream is always melting immediately straight from the fridge Commented Jun 15, 2020 at 13:39
  • Blowing on the ice cream will merely melt the outer layer, leaving the core to be still as frozen hard as it was. Best to let it stand, and for the thawing to be gradual; hence (assuming a temperate enough environment) the ice cream cools more uniformly. But this is a question for StackExchange Physics, not English Language Learners. Commented Jun 15, 2020 at 14:53

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If my table manners were indeed that appalling, I'd "blow on my soup" to cool it.

Never thought of doing something similar to ice-cream, the whole point of ice-cream is to eat it when it's as cold as possible.

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