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Meals have been traditionally prepared by women in a home kitchen (Painting from the circle of Jean-Baptiste de Saive, 1563)

A meal is an eating occasion that takes place at a certain time and includes prepared food.^[1][2] The names used for specific meals in English vary greatly, depending on the speaker's culture, the time of day, or the size of the meal.

Meals occur primarily at homes, restaurants, and cafeterias, but may occur anywhere. Regular meals occur on a daily basis, typically several times a day. Special meals are usually held in conjunction with such occasions as birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, events and holidays. A meal is different from a snack in that meals are generally larger, more varied, and more filling than snacks.^[3]

The type of meal served or eaten at any given time varies by custom and location. In most modern cultures, three main meals are eaten: in the morning, early afternoon, and evening. Further, the names of meals are often interchangeable by custom as well. Some serve dinner as the main meal at midday, with supper as the late afternoon/early evening meal; while others may call their midday meal lunch and their early evening meal supper. Except for "breakfast", these names can vary from region to region or even from family to family.

A study in 2016 by Toluna found that 47% of parents in the United States share fewer meals with their families than when growing up, and 58% wished they could do it more frequently, including 66% of dads.^[4]

Breakfast

Breakfast is the first meal of a day, most often eaten in the early morning before undertaking the day's work. Some believe it to be the most important meal of the day.^[5] The word breakfast literally refers to breaking the fasting period of the prior night.^[6]

Breakfast foods vary widely from place to place, but often include a carbohydrate such as grains or cereals, fruit, vegetables, a protein food such as eggs, meat or fish, and a beverage such as tea, coffee, milk, or fruit juice. Coffee, milk, tea, juice, breakfast cereals, pancakes, waffles, sausages, French toast, bacon, sweetened breads, fresh fruits, vegetables, eggs, baked beans, muffins, crumpets and toast with butter, margarine, jam or marmalade are common examples of Western breakfast foods, though a large range of preparations and ingredients are associated with breakfast globally.^[7]

Variations of breakfast

Full breakfast

A full breakfast is a breakfast meal, usually including bacon, sausages, eggs, and a variety of other cooked foods, with a beverage such as coffee or tea. It is especially popular in the UK and Ireland, to the extent that many cafés and pubs offer the meal at any time of day as an "all-day breakfast". It is also popular in other English-speaking countries.

In England it is usually referred to as a 'full English breakfast' (often shortened to 'full English') or 'fry-up'.^[8] Other regional names and variants include the 'full Scottish', 'full Welsh', 'full Irish' and the 'Ulster fry'.^[9][10][11]

The full breakfast is among the most internationally recognised British dishes, along with such staples as bangers & mash, shepherd's pie, fish and chips and the Christmas dinner.^[12] The full breakfast became popular in the British Isles during the Victorian era, and appeared as one among many suggested breakfasts in the home economist Isabella Beeton's The Book of Household Management (1861). A full breakfast is often contrasted (e.g. on hotel menus) with the lighter alternative of a Continental breakfast, traditionally consisting of tea, milk or coffee and fruit juices with bread, croissants, or pastries.

Instant breakfast

"Instant breakfast" typically refers to breakfast food products that are manufactured in a powdered form, which are generally prepared with the addition of milk and then consumed as a beverage.^[13][14] Some instant breakfasts are produced and marketed in liquid form, being pre-mixed. The target market for instant breakfast products includes consumers who tend to be busy, such as working adults.^[14]

Champagne breakfast

A champagne breakfast is a breakfast served with champagne or sparkling wine. It is a new concept in some countries^[15] and is not typical of the role of a breakfast.

It may be part of any day or outing considered particularly luxurious or indulgent. The accompanying breakfast is sometimes of a similarly high standard ^[16] and include rich foods such as salmon, caviar,^[17]chocolate or pastries, which would not ordinarily be eaten at breakfast^[18] or more courses.^[19]
Instead of as a formal meal the breakfast can be given to the recipient in a basket or hamper.

Lunch

Lunch, the abbreviation for luncheon, is a light meal typically eaten at midday.^[20] The origin of the words lunch and luncheon relate to a small snack originally eaten at any time of the day or night. During the 20th century the meaning gradually narrowed to a small or mid-sized meal eaten at midday. Lunch is commonly the second meal of the day after breakfast. The meal varies in size depending on the culture, and significant variations exist in different areas of the world.

Variations of lunch

A packed lunch (also called pack lunch, sack lunch or bag lunch in North America, or packed lunch in the United Kingdom, as well as the regional variations: bagging in Lancashire, Merseyside and Yorkshire,^[21]) is a lunch prepared at home and carried to be eaten somewhere else, such as school, a workplace, or at an outing. The food is usually wrapped in plastic, aluminum foil, or paper and can be carried ("packed") in a lunch box, paper bag (a "sack"), or plastic bag. While packed lunches are usually taken from home by the people who are going to eat them, in Mumbai, India, tiffin boxes are most often picked up from the home and brought to workplaces later in the day by so-called dabbawallas. It is also possible to buy packed lunches from stores in several countries. Lunch boxes made out of metal, plastic or vinyl are now popular with today's youth. Lunch boxes provide a way to take heavier lunches in a sturdier box or bag. It is also environmentally friendly.

Dinner

Dinner usually refers to the most significant and important meal of the day, which can be the noon or the evening meal. However, the term "dinner" can have many different meanings depending on the culture; it may mean a meal of any size eaten at any time of the day.^[22][23] Historically, it referred to the first meal of the day, eaten around noon, and is still sometimes used for a noon-time meal, particularly if it is a large or main meal. The meaning as the evening meal, generally the largest of the day, is becoming a standard in many parts of the English-speaking world.

Variations of dinner

Full course dinner

A full course dinner is a dinner consisting of multiple dishes, or courses. In its simplest form, it can consist of three to five courses, such as appetizers, fish course, entrée, main course and dessert.

Meals at other times of the day

Meal preparation

Meal preparation, sometimes called "meal prep," is the process of planning and preparing meals. It generally involves food preparation, including cooking.

Food preparation

Preparing food for eating generally requires selection, measurement and combination of ingredients in an ordered procedure so as to achieve desired results. Food preparation includes but is not limited to cooking.

Cooking

Cooking or cookery is the art, technology and craft of preparing food for consumption with the use of heat. Cooking techniques and ingredients vary widely across the world, from grilling food over an open fire to using electric stoves, to baking in various types of ovens, reflecting unique environmental, economic, and cultural traditions and trends. The ways or types of cooking also depend on the skill and type of training an individual cook has. Cooking is done both by people in their own dwellings and by professional cooks and chefs in restaurants and other food establishments. Cooking can also occur through chemical reactions without the presence of heat, most notably with ceviche, a traditional South American dish where fish is cooked with the acids in lemon or lime juice.

See also

• Outline of meals


• Food


• Human digestive system

References

Further reading

• Flandrin, Jean Louis (2007). Arranging the Meal: A History of Table Service in France. University of California Press.
  ISBN 0520238850
  


• Latham, Jean (1972) The pleasure of your company: a history of manners & meals, London: A. and C. Black.
  ISBN 0713612649
  


• 
  Pollan, Michael (2006). The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals. Penguin.
  ISBN 1594200823
  


• 
  This, Hervé (2009). Building a Meal: From Molecular Gastronomy to Culinary Constructivism. Columbia University Press.
  ISBN 0231144660
  

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to: Meal

• 
  “What Time is Dinner?” – a historian looks at the evolution of mealtimes.


• 
  “Small meals or big ones?” – a comparison of the number of meals taken per day.