In most of the United Kingdom (namely, the North of England, North and South Wales, the English Midlands, Scotland, and some rural and working class areas of Northern Ireland), people traditionally call their midday meal dinner and their evening meal tea (served around 6 pm), whereas the upper social classes would call ...
Across England as a whole, the majority (57%) call it “dinner”, while just over a third (36%) opt for “tea”. The remainder either call it something else (including 5% who say “supper”) or answered “don't know”. However, despite dinner's overall victory, the data shows there are clear geographical differences.
The terminology around eating in the UK is still confusing. For some "lunch" is "dinner" and vice versa. From the Roman times to the Middle Ages everyone ate in the middle of the day, but it was called dinner and was the main meal of the day. Lunch as we know it didn't exist - not even the word.
Traditional English Food for Lunch
For many families, a Sunday lunch of roast beef with Yorkshire pudding, pot roast pork with apples or roast lamb with green beans and mint sauce, is still a cherished tradition. If you don't fancy cooking it at home, your local pub is the place to go to for traditional English food.
New YouGov analysis among more than 42,000 English people reveals the real North/South divide: what people call their main evening meal. Across England as a whole, the majority (57%) call it “dinner”, while just over a third (36%) opt for “tea”.
If the meal you eat in the middle of the day is your main meal then it can be called either lunch or dinner. There is a tradition among some Australians to have a large family meal at lunch time on Sunday. It is often called Sunday dinner.
It's usage has nothing to do with being lower class for I attended a private school and was taught that the three meals of the day were breakfast, lunch and dinner and there were two snacks known as morning and afternoon tea. So that's the usage of the word in Brisbane.
luncheon. noun. formal lunch, especially a formal lunch for a lot of people.
By the early nineteenth century, lunch, what Palmer in Moveable Feasts calls "the furtive snack," had become a sit-down meal at the dning table in the middle of the day. Upper-class people were eating breakfast earlier, and dinner later, than they had formerly done...in 1808...
Breakfast: This is also called brekkie by some but not common. Breakfast is usually the same everywhere though the contents of breakfast will vary hugely. Both Britain and Ireland are famous for their cooked breakfast which is known as "full" or "cooked" breakfast.
Lunch lady, in Canada and the US, is a term for a woman who cooks and serves food in a school cafeteria. The equivalent term in the United Kingdom is dinner lady. The role is also sometimes known as cafeteria lady.
According to the majority of British adults (54 percent), the last meal of the day should be called 'dinner'. In fact, only four in ten Britons still refer to it as "tea", while just one in twenty (5 percent) call it 'supper'.
grub = a slang word for food.
11:00 - Elevenses. 12:00 - Lunch. 14:00 - Afternoon Tea. 18:00 - Supper.
Munch. A general term for food.
The word lunch originally comes from a shortening of luncheon, which was once used to mean the same thing but now more specifically refers to a formal lunch held in connection with a meeting or other special occasion. Lunch is the midday meal, commonly eaten around noon (though later in some places).
“High” tea. “High” tea is actually dinner but has also come to mean a lavish afternoon tea. In the past, high tea was an alternative to afternoon tea. It combined snacks and a hearty meal and was usually served at about 6pm.
When people in London suggest a time for lunch, they suggest 1pm.
Britain's favourite takeaway
Italian was the UK's favourite cuisine overall, with macaroni cheese and lasagne ranking as the top dishes. Indian food came second, with the iconic chicken tikka dish driving much of this interest.
Here in Australia, however, McDonald's most prevalent nickname is “Macca's”. A recent branding survey commissioned by McDonald's Australia found that 55 per cent of Australians refer to the company by its local slang name.
Servo: short for service station, this is what Australians call a gas station.
Arvo – Afternoon (S'Arvo – this afternoon!)