Hello,
Just moved to the UK from Canada. I am wondering if meal times are similar in both countries?
For example in Canada:
* Breakfast is anywhere from 7am-9am and consists of either cereal, toast, fruit, etc. with some coffee or tea. It is not a very heavy meal.
* Lunch is anywhere from 12pm-1pm and consists of something light as well like a sandwich with some fruit.
* Dinner is anywhere from 6-7pm and is the biggest meal of the day. Consists of some meat, vegetables and potatoes or bread or whatever.
Is the UK the same? I ask because I find it very odd that my sons daycare gives my son lunch at noon and a big ‘early evening snack’ at 4pm that to me is dinner (pasta, bread & other heavy foods) and definitely not a snack in Canada.
Thank you for any info!
16 comments
I would have the same schedule, except I have a one year old so we have similar to your son. Their times are different to what I would naturally do so everything is shifted a bit early for a few years on our house. Usually means we eat late night snacks.
Edit: oh and she has her main meal at lunch at nursery, but we always offer her something at 5:30ish that we try and do as a proper cooked family dinner. Sometimes she eats it, sometimes not.
Yup mine is pretty much the same!
That’s normal here. Apart for, some of us call lunch ‘dinner’, and dinner ‘tea’. So don’t get confused there!
Maybe it’s cos kids often go to bed a lot earlier than adults, so eating a main meal at 6-7pm would be too late for them? and maybe working parents, by the time they’ve picked up their child, if they then had to cook, would find it hard to give them a meal any earlier than 6-7pm? How old is your son? Less than 4, I assume?
Yeah, I’d say that schedule is pretty typical of the UK. Only difference is we probably have a lot more variety for dinner, if you mean that your dinner every day literally consists of meat, veg and potatoes.
8 am, 12-2pm, 4-6pm.
I think we tend to have our evening meal earlier than many other countries. It’s one of the things France hates about us, having dinner at 5pm when they wouldn’t think about eating before 7pm.
In our house we have dinner anytime between 5:30pm and 8pm depending on what we are up to.
Hey OP, welcome to the UK.
I would say that yes, meal times are pretty much the same. Lunch could even be as late as 2/3pm though and dinner could be as early as 5pm for some and as late as 8/9pm for others – whatever works with peoples schedules.
I would agree with you that it’s odd to give a child pasta at 4pm considering most children have dinner not long after that. Maybe just ask the daycare if they could sub the pasta/bread with some snacks you’ve provided such as fruit.
Best of luck settling in here!
It’s possibly more normal to have elevenses to keep you going, then lunch at 1. Dinner/supper/tea – often around 6 for school-age kids, 5pm even if they go to bed at 7.
So yes, a nursery will commonly give children breakfast if they are there by 8.30, lunch around 11.45, then tea around 4.15 so that children can be taken home between 5 and 6 and their parents don’t have to get them a big meal before bed, then parents can eat once the toddler is in bed.
School dinners (ie lunch) are so called because they are meant to be the substantial meal of the day. Whether they are depends on whether your kid likes and eats them…
It’s similar- I live in Canada and find that people eat dinner when going out for a meal really early and tend to be in bed early too. Generally if you have children you have tea around 5/5.30 because schools out around 3.30 so they tend to eat at that time and go to bed a couple of hours later. But adults will eat later, around 7pm. I would make dinner/tea for my children at 5.30 and hubby would eat his warmed up when he got home from work at 7 but if we ate out it would be later. It just depends on schedules. My children would have friends over for tea and go home around six, so I would give them all their tea before they went home. That’s also something to note – if you’re children get invited over for tea expect them to be fed, in Canada you call them play dates which is really weird but I guess they’re the same thing.
It’s roughly similar, although the time of the evening meal varies based on location. I’m used to having it (or at least starting to prepare it) at 5pm. Some people don’t eat until 8pm or 8:30pm.
Although in the south, it’s breakfast, lunch, dinner. In the north it’s breakfast, dinner and tea. My mum would sometimes use the confusing phrase, “We’re having dinner at dinner time” which meant the large meal of the day would be at 1pm. You’ll get used to us!
Yes that’s very normal.
Kids meals are generally a bit different – just an earlier and more condensed schedule and the hot/cold dinner are interchangeable. When my son was at private nursery they would give lunch (hot meal) at 11am, and then tea (cold meal) at 4pm, with a snack in between. A lot of kids have hot dinners at school and schools tend to stagger the mealtimes with the youngest eating first. Now he’s at school my son eats lunch at 11:40 but some kids eat at 12 or 12:20 in the older classes. Lots of kids have hot school meals, others have sandwich packed dinners. I tend to feed my son around 5pm so earlier than adults would eat as he goes to bed at 7pm. If he’s had a hot lunch I’ll give him a sandwich, if he’s had a packed lunch I’ll cook something.
Yeah your kids snack is a meal. Maybe theyre concerned that some kids wouldn’t have a proper evening meal if they don’t give them one. I also know plenty of kids under the age of 8 who do have their evening meal about 4-6pm, when they’re home from nursery or school, because they go to bed early.
As an adult, assuming work doesn’t get in the way, I have breakfast anytime from 8-10am. Then lunch is usually 12-1, maybe later if I had a filling breakfast such as bacon. Dinner is then served between 6-7:30. In reality I do shift work so on days I work I usually have my evening meal after 8pm.
My daughter at daycare gets cereal / toast at 8am, lunch 12, snack about 3pm that’s usually a sandwich or scones etc, maybe some fruit around 4-5pm if she’s wanting it! We pick her up at 530 and she has dinner at 6. She’s two.
sounds about the same
Breakfast timing is pretty consistent. I’d say most people eat light, but some people go for the heavy full English breakfast, especially people with a physical job.
Some people go later for lunch. Like my 6th form college had the lunch break 1:20-2:00.
Dinner varies *widely*. Having it later, closer to 9pm, is somewhat associated with the upper classes – who then might add afternoon tea between lunch and dinner.
Oh and terms vary. Northerners tend to call the midday meal dinner and the evening meal tea.
What about second breakfast?