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I have a few too many cloves of garlic in the tomato sauce.

1. I can't understand the meaning as how can something be 'a few' and 'too many' at the same time?

2. And, I found this sentence on a grammar site discussing how too, an adverb, modifies many, a quantifier. Then my next question is 'a few' is also a quantifier and quantifiers modifies nouns or noun phrases but here it came before the adverb 'too'...so is it modifying an adverb?

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    If the recipe calls for 12 cloves of garlic, and you use 18, that might be a few too many (slightly more than needed). If you use 50, that would probably be far too many (very much more than needed).
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 15:35
  • @Michael Harvey Thankyou, now I understand. Can U help me with the grammar part too?
    – RADS
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 15:57
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    "a few" is modifying "too many".
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 16:02
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    The sequence a few too many is very often used as sarcastic / ironic understatement. Particularly when the implied but unstated object of the expression is alcoholic drinks, where He's had a few too many normally means He's had far too much to drink (he's very drunk, not just slightly tipsy).
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 17:26

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This is quite a common usage in English.

a few too many

which Michael Harvey has explained in comments has a few modifying too many.

We also say

a little (bit) too much
a little too far
a tad too heavy

Although the last one is quite colloquial and may be British English, not sure

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  • Okay but I have never read in any grammar book that a determiner(quantifier in these cases) can modify adverbs.
    – RADS
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 16:58
  • @RADS adverbs often need modifying, examples might be: very slowly, too slowly.
    – mdewey
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 17:11
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    I am used to thinking that 'tad' was a mainly American usage that had crept into British English, but I see that Cambridge Dictionary says 'mainly UK informal', however I am fortified in my belief because I also gather that the OED lists it as "originally and chiefly N. Amer" and the first citation comes from a 1940 article in American Speech.
    – Michael Harvey
    Commented Jan 25, 2022 at 18:04

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