“I like to leave a generous tip.”

You've eaten out at a restaurant with a group of friends and are now paying the check. You leave $15 as a tip but your friend says that it's too much. You want to leave a little extra, so you say:

I like to leave a generous tip.

I like to (do something)

When you say "I like to ___", you're describing something that you usually do, or usually try to do. In the example above, the speaker is saying that he or she usually leaves a higher tip than is needed.

leave a tip

The most common verb to use with "tip" when you're at a restaurant is "leave", not "pay":

Did you leave a tip?

How much did you leave?

You use "leave" because the normal way of giving a waiter a tip is to leave the money on the table when you leave the restaurant. In other situations, like when you are tipping a taxi driver, you "give" instead:

I gave him a five dollar tip.

a generous tip

A "generous" person is one who gives things to other people freely. So you can call a person "generous". But you can also use "generous" to describe the things that a person freely gave to someone. Some common words that are used with "generous" are:

• a generous gift
• a generous tip
• a generous offer
• a generous amount of money
• someone's generous support